GWE Watching #8: Yuji Nagata

 Yuji Nagata vs. Kazuyuki Fujita, NJPW 6/6/2001

This was quite great. They had the MMA gloves and did hybrid style match. It wasn't UWF 2.0 or a BattlARTS knockoff match, they did their own thing here. The match felt like it could end at any moment, and the heat was off the charts. They really use things like the struggle over a takedown or Fujita trying to get mount to full effect. They really made people believe Fujita was gonna crush Nagatas skull once he got to mount position. Nagata looked like quite the valiant fighter trying to not get his head caved in by this beast. And well, then Fujita pretty much just smashed him. They never should have ditched the gloves.

Minoru Suzuki vs. Yuji Nagata, NJPW 11/3/2003

I am so used to seeing these two guys do a bunch of love tapping while making goofy faces that I was caught off guard by this being a no frills contest. Suzuki was projecting the aura of a killer at this time, and there was some really good grappling in this. He reminded me a bit of Negro Casas and that is huge praise. Nagata was a surely company ace here. Suzuki putting a random sleeper on Nagata and Nagata selling it like death created huge drama. Then you had Nagata catching Suzuki with a suplex and just trying to crush his shoulder with kicks. Suzukis selling actually was the right mix between being in serious pain and putting on his psycho act. Really good ending to an intense match.

Yuji Nagata vs. Enson Inoue, NJPW 7/21/2003

For some reason, I find Nagata tangling with some semitrained crowbar more entertaining than him dealing with his dojo mates. Enson was swinging wild punches here and trying to knock Nagatas block off. Nagata mostly used grappling to defend himself and looked solid. Then he nailed Inoue with a big suplex and that as it. Solid showing from Nagata, although he kinda needed to unleash a bigger asskicking to look truelybadass in a Hashimoto way against the fighter.

Yuji Nagata vs. Katsuyori Shibata, NJP 8/14/2003

Shibata is all punk here, throwing flurries of strikes and his gloves at Nagatas face. Nagata does a lot of grappling in these matches. I've really noticed it before, but I guess they were pushing his strength as a grappler since he had submission finishers and all. This was Shibata acting like a fucker and Nagata punishing him with some nasty face grinding and hard smacks. Nagata putting the boot down is no frills, mean and effective. Shibata looked like the more exciting wrestler, even as he got the snot beaten out of him. Unfortunately, the crowd was dead silent for Shibatas offense. Finish was fun with Stone Cold Nagata taking a chair to Yasuda.

U-DREAMS 1st Impact 11/12/1998

 I think this was also the only impact of this short lived organization.

Tomoharu Fuse vs. Mark Johnson

More Fuse content, baby. This was a cool opening match. No clue who Mark Johnson is (apparently  have been several MMA fighters named Mark Johnson), but he was good. He had good strikes, and carried the opening section with his cool throws and grappling. Fuse was along for the ride until he got full mount and started raining down punches on Johnon. He really turned it up after being outgrappled the whole time which is exactly what an outmatched fighter would do in that situation. One near KO later and what followed was a cool little run of false finishes including Fuse grapping a really cool spinning leglock. Wish we had gotten more shootstyle with MMA gloves because they utilized them well here.

Hidetada Irie vs. Tsunehito Naito

Naito is my boy, but future KINGDOM EHRGEIZ boss Irie completely squashes him here. Irie hit one or two cool kicks but his punches from mount where extremely lacking and there was no need for him to lazily dominate Naito for 3 minutes straight. It’s shootstyle, kick up the pace or at least brutally potatoe your opponent.

Tatsuo Nakano vs. Tom Burton

This was two tubby mulleted guys with sleazy mustaches basically beating on each other in a phone booth. I won’t pretend there was any genius wrestling going on here but I enjoyed watching these guys do some low distance fighting. Burton should’ve faced Ian Rotten at some point so we could know who the quintessential redneck shooter is.

Yoshiaki Fujiwara vs. Billy Scott

Getting to see Fujiwara do a faux PRIDE match is cool because it makes him do some fighting stance and striking work that you normally don’t see him to in typical UWF type matches. And Billy Scott is a really good grappler with fast movements and good tenacity that he matches up very well against Fujiwara. This went 5 minutes and really should have gone longer.

Enson Inoue vs. John Calvo

Two bulky guys tangling on the mat and punching each other for 2 minutes. Punches looked good although there is really no reason to run these kind of pro wrestling matches when real MMA is a thing.

Yoji Anjoh vs. Nicholas Starks

Anjos singlet with sparkly belt getup is just amazing. This ended up being another 2 minute squash. Anjoh just completely eats this poor guy up. Weird booking on this show, as you had a 16 minute opening match leading to a 2 minute main event. Maybe they were building to an epic Yoji Anjo vs. Tomoharu Fuse match on the next show before sponsors backed out or something.

 

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