Kitao Pro 2/21/1995

 Watch

 Card:

Masaaki Mochizuki vs. Masanobu Kurisu

Koji Kitao vs. Richard Byrne

Akio Kobayashi vs. Hiroshi Itakura

Al Snow vs. Takashi Okamura

Akio Kobayashi vs. Koki Kitahara

Koji Kitao vs. Osamu Tachihikari

Al Snow vs. Koki Kitahara

Koji Kitao vs. Masaaki Mochizuki

Ryuma Go vs. Kazuhiko Matsuzaki

Koji Kitao vs. Koki Kitahara

 

Ohh boy this card. In case you are confused – this is a tournament, with Tachihikari and Kitahara getting a BYE for some reason to skip the 1^st round. They removed the ring ropes for this show – smart move. Let's do it quick: Mochizuki/Kurisu was Mochi throwing really hard kicks and Kurisu throwing really hard headbutts and stomps for 3 minutes – so about what you expect. Then Mochi downs Kurisu, causing him to slip over the edge of the ring and almost land on his head outside, dear good. Kitao/Byrne – Byrne has an amazing Jerry Flynn/Bart Vale like american bullshido master look, but is squashed in 40 seconds when Kitao catches him with an admittedly pretty cool Volk Han like wrist lock. Itakura/Kobayashi – Itakura looks like the lost great talent of the 90s, as he wrestles like a tubby Kota Ibushi, fast, stiff, capable on the mat, cool spots – but gets kicked in the face by the lousy Kobayashi and fails to get up. Poor Itakura always gets the short end.

 

Snow/Okamura – it will never cease to amaze me how Snow got roped into doing this shit. Snow earns my respect by working a pretty solid 5 minute match against the not very good Okamura, hitting stiff palm rushes and actually getting the crowd behind him. Snow also eats one of the most brutal koppu kicks I've ever seen. Kobayashi/Kitahara (FUN) – Kobayashi is a slimy hateable dipshit, and Kitahara gets a surprisingly decent 3 minute match out of him where Kitahara sells for him a good amount but also tries to cave his face in. Kitao/Tachihikari – for a few seconds this was two fat sumos clobbering each other, and all was right in the world, then Kitao wins another 1 minute squash. Don't exhaust yourself, Kitao.

 

Snow/Kitahara (FUN) – this is the most promising matchup cause both these guys can actually work. Snow gets dropped on his shoulder with a german suplex and Kitahara painfully picks his shoulder apart. Snow tries hard, but at 3 minutes the match fell short just as it got really good, 1 or 2 minutes longer and it would've been more than just a pretty good little match. Kitao/Mochizuki – Mochizuki is next on Kitao's short pointless squash list. Ryuma Go/Matsuzaki – Go saves this show by beating the snot out of Matsuzaki with ultra stiff punches and headbutts and then tortures him on the mat and then some. Go is INSANE and I love him.God bless you, Champion of the Galaxy. Kitao/Kitahara (FUN) – Kitahara is the first guy who gets to do actual harm to Kitao. They beat the shit out of eachother and Kitao throws these brutal Vader Hammers, and brings out the Kitao Driller again. Eh I guess this was solid, brutal enough to be worthwhile, altough with a match as short as 4 minutes you have to go a little more all out than this for it to be something special.

 

The Library

Koki Kitahara Documentation Project Master List

 

Oriental Pro Oriental Birthday One Night Tag Tournament 8/15/1993

 Different Style: Keisuke Yamada vs. Masahiro Tsukuda

One of Yamadas earliest matches! He takes on the mysterious, boxing-gloved Tsukuda to open this show because why not. Mostly Yamada going for explosive takedowns and Tsukuda beating on him with those fists. Pretty short, energetic, and the crowd was really hot for this. Eh, why not.

Quarter Finals

Goro Tsurumi & Masahiko Takasugi vs. Toyonari Fujita & Hideo Takayama

Tsurumi and Takasugi are like the APA on this laying an assbeating on Fujita and the future Hido. Fujita goes for some elaborate flips that look impressive for a stocky guy but Takasugi just lariats his daylights out. Meanwhile Tsurumi is hanging Takayama outside the ring. Fujita eats some nasty chair shots and a piledriver before getting pinned. I think this lasted 2 or 3 minutes.

The Scalper & The Geezer vs. Jun Kikuwada & Kazuhiko Matsuzaki

The Scalper and Geezer are a pair of hooded figures. They must've gotten some trainees to play these monsters because they are extremely limited brawlers. I think Kikuwada who has boxing gloves is the future Shinjuku Shark and he is kind of the star in this punching the monsters and hitting a suicide dive. Not much else here besides the monsters doing claw holds.

Hiroshi Itakura & Nobutaka Araya vs. Fukumentaro & Winger

This was a "workrate" match compared to everything that came before. Everyone just busted out their moves. Araya was really green here (he kind of no sells a german suplex completely) but he had nice powerbombs and a moonsault. I always enjoy watching Itakura and while Fukumentaro and Winger aren't very good they don't blow it completely here. Okay 7 or 8 minutes.

Poison Sawada & Masaru Toi vs. Hiroshi Shimada & Hirofumi Miura

Poison Sawada teams with Toi here, not Kenichiro Yukimura like Cagematch claims. The camera man misses a good chunk of this. I enjoyed Toi and Shimada stiffing people. Toi has a nasty double stomp and boots people in the face and Shimada hit big lariats and nasty short kicks. Miura wasn't doing his karate act yet and he isn't better or worse as a generic guy.

Semi Finals

Hiroshi Shimada & Hirofumi Miura vs. Hiroshi Itakura & Nobutaka Araya

This match was whatever, but Shimada hit this amazing full speed dive over the top rope. It was awe inspiring. He didn't even do a sloppy Undertaker dive, just went full flying couch on people, outstretched over the 3rd rope. After that Itakura hits a dive and he and Araya act like big shots as if we all didn't just see Shimada doing something that was about 10000 times cooler? They kind of isolate Miura for a bit and instead of making a hot tag he just gets pinned. Shimada didn't even try to safe him. Guess he was happy with just that dive he hit.

Kazuhiko Matsuzaki & Jun Kikuwada vs. Goro Tsurumi & Masahiko Takasugi

Fun stiff brawl. I buy Tsurumi and Takasugi as tough old guys cleaning out a bar. This was all about Tsurumi shrugging off Matsuzakis stiff kicks and Kikuwadas punches. The Kikuwada/Tsurumi exchanges were especially cool. Takasugi also busted out his awesome crowbar dropkick. This went 6 minutes which was just the right amount of time.

Final

Hiroshi Itakura & Nobutaka Araya vs. Goro Tsurumi & Masahiko Takasugi

This was the first match that had some kind of build and we get some cool basic opening exchanges with Tsurumi and Takasugi doing basic opening moves in really rough veteran fashion. Really dug all the punch variations Tsurumi throws especially his punches to the gut. It felt like Itakura and Araya had to survive a stiff onslaught from the veterans and that gave the match some structure and purpose. As usual the match spills to the outside  with Tsurumi breaking out the noose again - and I don't know if it was restarted or if it was like that from beginning but apparently this is elimination rules now which gives us two fun finishes. One has Takasugi just decimating Araya with a Vader-level german suplex and some nasty lariats before he and Itakura work a bunch of nearfalls. Takasugi usually doesn't sell and just destroys everyone so Itakura going even steven with him felt like a nice moment. Good main event.

THE LIBRARY

Oriental Pro 1/20/1993

 Oriental Pro 1/20/1993

1. Kazuhiko Matsuzaki vs. Ryo Miyake
2. Miguel Perez Jr. vs. The Winger
3. Yoshihiko Abe vs. Katsumi Hirano
4. Great Sasuke & TAKA Michinoku vs. Super Delfin & Terry Boy
5. Handicap: Toyonari Fujita & Hideo Takayama vs. Masahiko Takasugi
6. OPW vs. W*ING Elimination Gauntlet Match: Kazuhiko Matsuzaki & Nobutaka Araya & Hiroshi Itakura vs. Masayoshi Motegi & The Winger & W*ing Kanemura

This was another fun Oriental Pro card. You're always going to get some largely unspectacular but snug and solid pro wrestling with Oriental Pro, which is much needed these days. You had a nice 10 minute draw in the opener with enough stiff shots to keep it interesting, a nasty one sided wrestler vs. karateka squash where Abe kicks Hirano in the eye over and over and his students jump into the ring axe kicking Oriental Pro wrestlers after the match, plus a fun squash in the Takasugi handicap match where he just tears up the future Badboy Hido and Magnitude Kishiwada.

The standout matches were a) the M-Pro tag, where they worked a straight match with no shtick and basically showed off their superior athleticism and skill level and b) the main event.

The opening half of this was fascinating and made my respect for Masayoshi Motegi shoot up tenfold. Motegi came in with a bandaged shoulder. His first opponent was Kazuhiko Matsuzaki, who immediately begand attacking that shoulder which made their basic opening exchanges highly interesting. Motegis amateur moves were great and Matsuzaki looked like a mini-Hashimoto when he started throwing kicks. Motegi caught him in a surprise suplex though and quickly put him away, leading to Motegi vs. Araya being next.

Araya, who was skinny at this point, then proceeded to tear up Motegis shoulder for another solid 10 minutes, inbetween throwing him around and hitting stiff chops and clotheslines. It probably got excessive as Motegi just kept surviving, but it was fascinating to watch Motegi get out of one armbar attempt after another through bridging etc. Araya also had a bandaged lower back, and his immediate desperation selling when Motegi was able to hit a basic slam followed by a half crab was great. The spot where Araya attempted a lift and collapsed followed by Motegi going for his german suplex only for his destroyed shoulder to give out was great and the last pinfall was epic. One of the best payoffs to an injury centered matchup I've ever seen.

The weakest matchup there was Winger/Itakura, although it was pretty much the best use of Winger I can imagine as he got in a series of quick hopespots before being handily put away by Itakura, who was pretty much the ace of Oriental Pro at this point.

The last matchup was Itakura vs. Kanemura, which promised to be interesting as Kanemura was already a sick freak at this stage. It started out strong with Kanemura eating a nasty surprise savate kick and powerbomb, then he started biting and using chairs. Itakura came back bleeding and they produced a dramatic finish which such a big convoluted match deserved. Overall all the parts of the match worked by themselves and also formed a compelling whole interacting with eachother, which is why I'm nominating it as one thing.

THE LIBRARY

Oriental Pro 12/3/1992

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAceUUApF_c

Wellington Wilkins Jr. vs. Katsumi Hirano

Hirano is a low level guy who likes to play shooter, and he is almost completely useless. Wilkins Jr. though gets an entertaining match out of him by eating him up completely. Wilkins looked like the total package here roughing up Hirano with submissions, cool suplexes and judo throws aswell as those nasty ground headbutts he does. The sole moment where Hirano gets to do something is when Wilkins temporarily loses balance allowing Hirano to lock in a lucky submission, which doesn't last long as Wilkins soon taps him out with a basic side headlock.

Akihiro Mikada vs. Nobutaka Araya 

I liked this more on rewatch. It's a slow paced match with a lot of holds, but there was some escalation to the holds, Mikada would try the same hold twice and Araya would reverse in cool fashion. Mikada peppering Araya with stiff kicks was a lot of fun. Match went a little too long for their own good and pro style Araya didn't show me as much at this stage, but this was solid enough for rookie undercard action.

Brian Lee vs. Masahiko Takasugi

The next bout was veteran Takasugi vs. An ultra generic blonde Brian Lee. Takasugi was still pretty spry and they worked an IWE type match with Lee roughing up his opponent and then Takasugi fighting fire with fire. Basic stuff again, and they ended the match just as it seemed to get hot. 

Yukihiro Kanemura & Masayoshi Motegi vs.Kazuhiko Matsuzaki & Hiroshi Itakura 

Fun juniors match with some piss and vinegar. I really liked Matsuzaki here, who was cracking everyone with hard headbutts and kicks, aswell as Itakura who can do both slick junior flips aswell as spin kick someone in the throat. I liked the flaring tempers, the dive sequence and the finish. I thought Kanemura went to the well too often with his STF. That was a hot move in 1992 and while it initially increased the tension, by the 3rd time he locked the move in it was reduced to a resthold. Bad psychology.

Ryuma Go & Jesse Barr vs. Ron & Don Harris (Texas Deathmatch in a cage~!) 

Good clobbering brawl with lots of blood. This kind of match would look really good-great in front of a hot US crowd but with this kind of subdued japanese crowd the whole thing felt a little dry, despite plenty of juice and fire. I liked how the crowd got into Jesse's toughness as he absorbed all of the Harris Bros high end tag team offense and the finish was a fun outsmarting the rules moment.

THE LIBRARY

NSPW 9/24/1994

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUlfpTENhaA

NSPW (or maybe: NFPW) was a shootstyle indy that went for serious fighting ala UWFi. Now that's something you don't see everyday. Actually, TV Tropes of all places has a bit of info on this, describing it as "regional UWF". Now, how cool is that? The japanese wiki says the promotion folded after all the fighters got their asses kicked in Shooto, and we mourn the loss of an obscure micro-shootstyle indy. But at least, we still have this tape.

Hiroshi Osuma vs. Katsumi Hirano

Yukimasa Yokota vs. Shingo Shigeta

Takashi Hara vs. Masamitsu Kochi

Yoshiro Ito vs. Keisuke Yamada

Koichiro Kimura vs. Fumio Akiyama

Ricky Fuyuki/Jado/Gedo vs. Hiroshi Itakura/Hideo Takayama/Ichiro Yaguchi

 

Most of the fights were too clipped up to be assessed, but the fighters looked polished and worked plenty stiff, with Shigeta taking a pretty brutal beating in the second match but refusing to give up. Osuma vs. Hirano was a boxer vs. Wrestler match that was actually pretty good, which is a rare accomplishment. I assume most of these guys are from SAW given that Koichiro Kimura is also on this card, but that's pure speculation as I can't find any info at all on this fed.

Ito vs. Yamada was shown in full and was a pretty cool little clash, like a poor man's Vader/Tamura. Lots of potatoe shots, and Ito, who could still move well at this point, was slamming the fuck out of Yamada with pro style powerbombs and suplexes. Yamada is the future Black Buffalo (of all people) and had some cool judo throws on Ito's roided ass. Yamada looked the most talented of anyone on the card and it feels like a waste that he went on to do garbage wrestling for the rest of the 90s. 

Fumio Akiyama seemed to be embarassing himself in the semi main event. Not sure what was up with that.

The main event was a typical Fuyuki/Jado/Gedo affair where they beat the shit out of the NSPW guys, bloodying and triple teaming them and waffling them with chairs. The NSPW all had kickpads (future face painted garbage brawler Yaguchi was doing a sambo gimmick at this point) and liked to kick hard, the future Badboy HIDO also doing a kickboxer gimmick, Itakura had a really nice dive aswell, but it seems most of their offense was clipped out which is a weird decision. They just got destroyed and the Fuyuki trio hit all their huge triple team moves including a powerbomb off the top and a huge assisted butt drop from Fuyuki. Fun stuff and Fuyuki is such a bastard in the match.

THE LIBRARY

Oriental Pro 8/2/1992

 Oriental Pro was the follow-up fed to Pioneer Senshi. It wasn't quite as delightfully shootstylish as Pioneer, but there was still some fun to be had with this fed.

Kazuhiko Matsuzaki vs. Katsumi Hirano

 I love that every Oriental Pro card opens with a shootstyle match. Only problem here was that half the action was blocked by the audience with their umbrellas. Looked like a good 10 minute opening draw though. Matsuzaki is thick and will get aggressive to push the pace.

 

 Mike Winner vs. Nobutaka Araya

A brief squash altough Winner looked good controlling the very young Araya on the ground twith amateur style grappling.
 

Harris Brothers vs. Korean Kim & Korean Lee

One of the koreans is a skinny martial artist who will do spin kicks and high pitched yelling like a hong kong movie. The other is an elderly guy with a mustache who does elaborate flips (for 1992 standards). The Harris Bros make the best of it and this ends up being pretty entertaining.

Ryuma Go vs. Sumito the Samoan

Some crowdbrawling here which the camera doesn’t catch at all. Match didn’t look like anything special, anyways. Sumito gets to headbutt Go a bit but is defeated quite easily. No wonder Go would move on to battling aliens soon after.

 Hiroshi Itakura vs. Jesse Barr

In a world where junior wrestling is a fucking flea circus the simplicity of Oriental Pro Wrestling is a breath of fresh air. This was a solid house show main with Barr letting Itakura look good. Barr isn't exactly a maestro but there was something cool about his technical moves. Itakura seemed green here stringing his moves together. Really liked Barrs nasty modified chickenwing crossface (he basically grounds the opponent and twists clockwise) aswell as him doing the Backlund lift in a way that made sense. Barr catches Itakura when he tries a handspring moves and then wins following a kneedrop off the second rope. You kind of have to love it.

Pioneer Senshi / JWP Joint Show 4/28/1990

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gJ5UCcVtSw

Devil Masami vs. Harley Saito

I wonder how this Pioneer Senshi/JWP joint show came to be. Was it a case of Ryuma Go not having enough wrestlers to run a show of his own, so he asked JWP to borrow their ring and some wrestlers? Then again, JWP was running some wrestler vs. martial artist matches on their own shows during this time period, so maybe there was more Pioneer Senshi inspiration than usual in JWP. Maybe there was a Rumi Kazama vs. a korean taekwondo artist main event on this show that went unfilled. As far as this Devil Masami/Harley Saito match goes, joshi matches that serve as undercard to mens matches tend to be filler, and that was the case here, although there was a nice Devil Masami control segment where she worked over Saitos wrist, and an especially nice Harley Saito control segment where she started by kicking Devil in the back of the head and then working over her back with more thudding kicks. Devils comeback is kinda lame as she catches a kick for a leglock, briefly acknowledging the work on her back before hitting some lariats and powerbombs for the win. I was surprised how easily Saito was defeated here as she was on her way to the JWP main event in 1990, but maybe they didn’t expect JWP fans to pay attention to this show.

Hiroshi Itakura vs. Hideki Kawauchi 

These two had a fantastic match the previous year. This was more of a hybrid junior match than the shootstyle of their first match. There are lockups, side headlocks, hammerlocks and tope rope moves, but the stylistic marks of their first match – crunching suplexes, ultra tight submissions and some brutal strikes where still there. If you ask me, this is the style that should’ve dominated 90s junior wrestling. In this match, Itakura was pushing the pace by giving Kawauchi a nasty hiding, who kept coming back using his grappling and occasionally a big kick of his own. Itakuras spin kicks were absolutely brutal as he came close to crushing Kawauchis face. There was also a crazy stiff baseball slide that launched Kawauchi to the outside. Kawauchi for his own had a really beautiful belly to belly suplex into a bridging pin. Some crazy deep, joint popping arm submission nearfalls. The match was a bit clunky in some parts as I felt these guys are better when they are just doing straight shootstyle, but overall this was everything you can ask for from a grimy 90s indy undercard wrestling.

Miss A (Dynamite Kansai) vs. Eagle Sawai

This was a bit better than the opening Saito/Masami match. It was also filler, but Miss As kicks are just sickeningly violent even for Pioneer Senshi match and the match develops around Sawai trying to not get kicked to death. Some fun big girl fighting ensues and both hit some nice elbows drops, body checks and lariats. These two had a very good match on a proper JWP show and while this was by no means essential viewing it was a cool piece in Miss As work during the time period.

Ryuma Go vs. Masashi Aoyagi (Rounds)

Love these two, but there was absolutely no reason for this to go 30 minutes. I guess they were trying to one up the Onita/Aoyagi feud by going broadway, but matches like this really don’t work like that. As a result of the length there wasn’t much going on and Gos submission attempts felt like restholds. Once both guys were bleeding, things got pretty intense, but it took them about 10 rounds to get there, and then the match went another 10 minutes or so. Still love the variety of strikes Aoyagi threw, though. Also the crowd got super into this so who am I to judge.

Pioneer Senshi 10/26/1989

 

Pioneer Senshi feels like a fed unfairly lost to obscurity. After all, this is one of the founding blocks of japanese indy wrestling, being the first "true" japanese indy founded by Ryuma Go and a few ex-IWE guys frustrated with their spot in AJPW, and a small but potent handful of wrestlers got their starts here, later cohabiting the cards of 90s indy feds. Most Pioneer cards are young workers filling up with a few guys who'd be undercard nobodies in NJPW and AJPW working main events. Go is the only one who's achieved significance through his battles with Fujinami in the late 70s, so he gets to play the ace role.

The Pioneer Senshi debut show had only two matches, due to a lack of wrestlers. I am assuming this is either the 2nd show or they had been touring regional places for months. Style-wise Pioneer was pretty interesting, as it resembled almost a proto-BattlARTS with a mix of pro and shootstyle influences, all the young guys could grapple and you really get the sense Pioneer Senshi would've made an awesome fusion partner for Pro Wrestling Fujiwara Gumi.

Kazuhiko Matsuzaki vs. Kazuhiro Hashizume

I am assuming this is both guys debut match. Kazuhiko Matsuzaki would go on to work every sleaze indy there was in the 90s. Hashizume would disappear back into the void. This was a shootstyle match. Pioneer Senshi shootstyle is slightly different from the UWF shootstyle of the time, it’s more grappling and suplex oriented but also more dynamic. Guys don’t wear kickpads and it very much feels like something out of the 1930s. This definitely had the feel of two guys with a background in amateur wrestling who had only learned a few basic holds like a side headlock and an armbar going on to to have match. It was pretty fun, Matsuzaki is bigger, but Hashizume was aggressive and even went to slap the shit out of him a few times. These guys grappled hard and never slowed the pace down, and they both took a few stiff shots proving they had the guts. This was rounds for some reason, maybe Ryuma Go being nostalgic about his early career spent in Germany, in anyway it helped them stretch out and work a draw to earn the respect of the audience. I would’ve liked a bit more aggression before the ending occurred but as an introduction to the mysterious world of Pioneer Senshi it was good and I don’t really see why we can’t have this kind of pro wrestling anymore.

Hiroshi Itakura vs. Hideki Kawauchi

Damn great match, possibly the greatest black trunks rookie match of all time. The reason for that is that this isn't your regular black trunks rookie match, instead it's two very young guys basically working a high end 20 minute shootstyle match that resembled 1950s pro wrestling here and there. Itakura ended up some kind of unfairly shafted 90s indy undercard hero, and Kawauchi was never seen or heard from again, and the concept of this kind of experimental indy shootstyle pretty much fell off the radar until BattlARTS was created 7 years later. It feels earned that these two went all out on a random card that just happened to be filmed so we can watch it and declare it an awesome match 30 years later. Kawauchi is the smaller of the two but he doesn't look outmatched at all. The early parts of the match see Kawauchi pushing the pace with superior amateur skills. The cool thing about this is that they work in some basic pro wrestling moves, like a drop toe hold or headscissor, but they really work these as shootstyle moves. Kawauchi's ground moves were inspired and when Itakura caught him with an awesome flying armbar (a holy shit spot in 1989) it felt like an awesome moment. As soon as Itakura got the advantage he would throw his smaller opponent around like a ragdoll, altough Kawauchi fired back with some nasty stiff kicks and then awesome suplexes of his own. While the matwork wasn't super slick and flashy, there are some crafty reversals (especially dug Itakura wringing his way out of a legbar) and some of the deepest Fujiwara armbars you'll ever see. While the striking wasn't a huge focus in the match as both guys were hellbent on forcing a tap, anytime both guys threw strikes felt suitably epic. There are some awesome 1950s like dropkicks and spin kicks. I also got the say the suplexes in this match were just awesome and some of the best I've ever seen. Even the more pro style suplexes, like a gutwrench or double underhook suplex felt like the guy was brutally hammered into the mat. There was also a great Randleman-like side suplex. Kawauchi going for a flying armbar of his own and failing feels like something that should happen more often. So, a really intense match with awesome suplexes and striking and some of the tightest submission work you'll ever see, with Kawauchi giving a cool gutsy performance fighting of his bigger opponent... damn I wish all pro wrestling felt this real and intense. 

Apparently this was Itakuras debut match. Probably Kawauchis too. Talk about starting out with a bang.

Masahiko Takasugi vs. Masato(?) Ueno

No guarantee on Uenos name. He is another guy who disappeared into the void. Maybe he ended up becoming The Scalper in Oriental Pro Wrestling. Ueno is thick and has a beard, but due to him not showing up anywhere else ever I assume he is also a rookie in his debut match. This was another rounds match. Takasugi is an IWE vet who I enjoy not because he is a well rounded pro wrestler but because he will usually beat the snot out of some hapless rookie in violent fashion. This was the least one sided Takasugi vs. Rookie match I’ve ever seen as Ueno was inspired and got in quite a bit of offense, throwing Takasugi around with some suplexes of his own and hitting stiff kicks to the mid section. Of course Takasugi comes back crushing him, dropping him with big suplexes and hitting those cool short kicks he does with a thud every time. This style they were using here was really cool, Takasugi was working a bit more like a typical pro style worker, but Ueno would just keep on staying on him and continueing to grapple. Ueno ends up dropping Takasugi with a big damn powerbomb and it really looks like Takasugi is in trouble and he is forced to try and work the legs. Then the last round happens and he just grabs a super nasty half crab and leans all the way back forcing a tap in classic Takasugi fashion. Still, this was way too fun considering it could’ve just been a flat one sided squash.

Ryuma Go vs. Fumihiro Niikura

This was a really fun cagey bout between two veteran workers who'd never get a chance like this in an established fed. Almost all on the mat, and it felt like quasi shootstyle as both guys constantly went for submissions with intent to force a tap. The real story here may have been Niikura, there's probably no other match where he gets to do his thing like he does here. He gets to look sharp blasting Go with mean kicks (including an enzuigiri that caught Go flush in the mouth), busts out his signature cool punch combo and hits some gnarly suplexes. This needed a bit more selling to be GREAT - as a  +20 match of mostly matwork between two not super flashy, aging workers without a story can be a little rough. Still the action was good and if you are even reading this hell you are probably totally down for two obscure workers in the twilight of their careers stepping out to hit the mat hard and trade big suplexes for 20 minutes anways. Here's to you Fumihiro Niikura, you made the most of this night.