Kitao Pro 2/21/1995

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 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.

 

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Koki Kitahara Documentation Project Master List

 

Assorted Joshi

 

Akira Hokuto & Chigusa Nagayo & Hiromi Kato vs. Meiko Satomura & Toshie Uematsu & Sakura Hirota GAEA 2/22/1997

I think this may have been a GAEA match that didn't seem to air on TV, although I may be misremembering. Another really good upload, whoever is curating this channel is really doing a good job. Loved the opening, where first Satomura et all try triple teaming Kato, then Hokuto runs in to save her but they end up triple teaming her, which backfires to Hokuto and her team trying to reverse the numbers game only for it to backfire and Team Satomura triple teaming Kato anyways. The match plays out nice and story driven, as Kato takes a beating but whenever Hokuto or Nagayo tagged in the would destroy the rookies and send them into desperation mode. Hokuto almost kicked Satomuras head off with her big spin kick. I loved all the Satomura/Nagayo interactions, Nagayo blew off her strikes so Satomura later went for a bunch of great desperation armbars at her. As usual with peak GAEA the match had a few fantastic moments. Great finish aswell. Another piece in the fantastic year this company had.

Mariko Yoshida vs. KAORU, AJW 8/28/1994

Yoshida had been injured and out of the ring for over 20 months. This was her return singles match, and it‘s one hell of a show. Even though this was not spider lady Yoshida, she was at her a-game. The match resembled a MUGA match, with both girls doing some intense grappling and stretching, and the few strikes they threw were hard as all hell. There were also a few neat spots and smart counters and learned spots. KAORU came across as quite the killer in this, focussing on Yoshidas neck, either elbowing her or applying painful looking bends, with Yoshida doing a great job selling the increasing trauma. Yoshida came across as giving her all in the match. It made the last couple minutes feel even greater as Yoshida seemed on the verge of securing the win before KAORU nailed a tombstone piledriver out of nowhere, followed with a wiping out quebrada and then just crushed Yoshida with 3 moonsaults in a row before getting the victory. After such a competitive match such a non-even finish felt like a real exclamation mark and Yoshida was pretty emotional in her post-match promo. Such a unique match that really stands out against the usual AJW midcard stuff and an absolute banger. It foreshadowed how these two would go on to make other promotions so much more exciting than AJW.

 

Azumi Hyuga vs. Kaori Yoneyama, JWP 2/20/2005

Really great match that crosses the high-impact go-go style of these two with plenty of vicious rookie-veteran cut off spots. Plenty of Yoneyama smacking the shit out of Hyuga, and Hyuga in turn punishing her with mean stomps on her head and face. Hyuga can be questionable in lengthy workrate sprints but she was impeccable here cranking up the viciousness and doing some very tight wrestling, while knowing when to sell in order to put her opponent over as pushing her to the limit. Yoneyama looked great here, tremendous energy and working really stiff, elbowing Hyuga in the head, spin kicking her in the face etc. Plenty of cool details, such as Yoneyama starting to run when Hyuga was on the top rope only to eat a really fast missile dropkick. Yoneyamas blown Yoshitonic may have actually added to the match as it came across as a desperation move gone awry that knocked both of them loopy. Yoneyamas constant nastiness throughout the match kept building and building until she just exploded with an insane flury of elbows to a grounded Hyuga, by the far the highlight of the match. The ending run was pretty grandiose but really well executed with plenty of neat finisher teases and counters. By far one of the best singles matches of 2005.

2 Cold Scorpio Documentation Project #4

2 Cold Scorpio vs. Taz, ECW 1/10/1998 - GREAT

Cool TV match. Taz has his flaws, but the suplex and submission style is crazy over with me. This had a nice opening with both guys going to the mat and working some cool basic exchanges, with the ECW crowd showing an unusual appreciation for the mat stuff. They get more into ECWisms as they start brawling around the ring and smashing into chairs, but the finishing run was really nice with Taz busting out gnarly suplexes that Scorpio bumps huge for and Scorpio hitting some devastating highspots before a neat finish. A good night of work from Scorpio.

2 Cold Scorpio vs. Yoshinobu Kanemaru, NOAH 11/5/2005 - GREAT

This was for NOAHs 'Hardcore Title'. Not a great title, but god damn this was Scorpio with his working boots on, and working boots Scorpio is amazing. He hits some cool punch combos, talks shit and really goes out of his way to make Kanemaru look amazing. I imagine Scorpio called the action because I don't recall many instances where Kanemaru looked as great as he did here, hitting some cool twisting headscissors before connecting with a huge dropkick to the outside and a big knee drop to the back of the head as Scorpio was dangling from the ramp. Scorps selling was pretty much masterful as he sold the fuck out of Kanemarus shitty low blows, to the point where even the crowd started giving a shit and caring for the possibility that Kanemaru might upset Scorpio and take that stupid belt. Even paying attention to the time limit rule in Hardcore title matches! The clothesline Scorp hit during the finishing stretch felt more important than a probably 99.9% of clotheslines ever thrown and Kanemura did something right by taking a hellacious bump for it. Really amazing what you can get when you let a guy like Scorpio do his thing.

 

2 Cold Scorpio vs. Go Shiozaki, NOAH 4/3/2005 - GREAT

Scorp leads Shiozaki through a really nice solid match. Really liked the opening hold exchanges, Scorpio feels so forceful  when he takes a guy down. Shiozaki was just doing basic stuff but that was alright. Loved Scorpio kneeing Shiozaki in the kidney and slapping him in the face to escalate the violence. We get some brutal kicks from Scorpio in this, some great jumping knees and big boots that left Shiozaki bleeding from the nose. Scorpio pin point punching a bleeding Shiozaki in the face was about as good as pro wrestling gets. Finish was somewhat routine, but you have to remember Shiozaki was a rookie at this point. It does make you wonder why they didn't let Scorpio do this kind of match more often because he looks great leading to a guy to a classy 15 minute bout. Certainly, Shiozaki might have turned into a good wrestler if they had let him wrestle Scorpio more often.

2 Cold Scorpio Documentation Project

BJW 1/9/2005

 

They decided to run a cool one night tournament with some interesting participiants for this show.

First Round: Manabu Hara vs. HERO!

HERO! is of course HARASHIMA in his kind of bland masked gimmick. They mesh very nice on the mat, ‘shima has no problem doing smooth shootstyle matwork and Hara mostly dominates the action dominating on the ground and hitting a big suplex, as well as totally stonewalling Harashimas attempts to do anything pro style. I imagine a 10 minute match between them would’ve been pretty good, at 5 minutes this was still a neat bit.

First Round: Kyosuke Sasaki vs. Naoki Numazawa

I’m not sure if Numazawa was a full time death match guy at this point. He was really schlubby in his ill fitting boots, shirt and tights. Sasaki kicks him a bit and Numazawa kills time with solid but boring offense. Sasaki wins with ease. Nothing match but it made Sasaki look strong going into the second round.

First Round: Mineo Fujita vs. Masanori Ishikura

Yes, Ishikura! They got a lot of kickpadded shooters for this tournament. This was 6 minutes and for two indy juniors doing a vacuum junior match it wasn’t bad. Fujita has really pretty execution on all his stuff and Ishikura hits a big jumping knee in his face. Transform this to a WCW b-show and it would have made a great addition to any b-side comp tape.

First Round: Daisuke Sekimoto vs Kunio Toshima

The longest match in the first round even though it had the most basic workers. It was still a pretty good match with Toshima working like Otani. No kidding, he was doing big boots, face washes, springboard dropkicks, working over Sekimotos arm something fierce. Toshimas single minded determination on attacking Sekimotos arm, gnarly big boots and Sekimotos affinity for single-minded matches made this a pretty good encounter. Also, Sekimoto actually sold all that armwork and Toshimas stubborn arm attacks made an armbar finish plausible.

Semi-Finals: HERO! vs. Kyosuke Sasaki

This went 12 minutes and it was the DDT vs. U-Style encounter you never knew you craved. The do a bunch of really nice slick matwork. Sasaki looks really good here kicking the crap out of ‘shima and working a nasty neck crank. HERO! stuck to junior offense but they had a fun dynamic going. They also reference the finish of the first round HERO match so that was a nice touch.

Semi-Finals: Daisuke Sekimoto vs. Mineo Fujita

Fujita tries rushing Sekimoto at the start and hits some offense. Then Sekimoto comes back and hits some offense, pretty much gobbling Fujita up. I liked Fujitas tricky pin attempt but this was extremely forgettable.

Finals: Daisuke Sekimoto vs. HERO!

Opening WoS-like hold exchanges were kind of cool. Sekimoto is so bulky it looks really cool when busts out a smooth takedown, and HERO has a really pretty Santo headscissor. After a big HERO dive, Sekimoto did some nice work on his mid section. Unfortunately they kind of stopped being on the same page for a minute and the rest of the match ended up being listless randomness. Sekimotos lack of intensity was really jarring, like he looked like he was about to check his watch the whole time.

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FUTEN undercard matches

 Shoichi Uchida vs. Mitsuya Nagai, FUTEN 4/24/2010

That moment you watch a random FUTEN undercard match and it’s better than pretty much anything you’ve watched from recent times. Hellish match where Nagai was trying to blast Uchida to smithereens with his kicks. Uchida was gutsy really gutsy here, I really liked how he kept shooting for desperate takedowns which Nagai kept stuffing, really nice example of big vs. little psychology in a shootstyle match. Nagais submissions were ultra nasty and Fuchi-ish. Uchidas one bit of offense was really cool, Nagai goes for another big kick but got his foot caught in the ropes allowing Uchida to hit a suplex and then immediately trying for a choke on Nagai. Nagai then proceeded to try to rip Uchida in half some more. And one points both guys traded absolutely sickening headbutts. Gnarly stuff, wish we still had this.

Manabu Hara vs. Brahman Kei, FUTEN 10/24/2010

 

Nifty undercard match. Kei can’t stand up to Hara but he uses some heel tactics to even things out. Basically anytime Hara was able to stand up and go on offense, he was crushing Kei with brutal kicks and lariats. Kei threw some hard kicks of his own and there were a couple neat transitions. His desperate armbar counter was really good and the finish was neat. Amazing how much you can do in a 6 minute match without coming across as forcing it.

Tamon Honda vs. Brahman Shu, FUTEN 10/24/2010

Really fun match built around Shu mostly kicking Honda in the leg really really hard. It’s odd that Honda is this well respected veteran but Shu really kicks the crap out of him, FUTEN factor I guess. Shu having to build up a simple suplex because Honda is such a beast was cool and his kicks and slaps were landing really hard. Honda had almost no offense in the match except his Dead End and Olympic Hell but he’s awesome regardless.

Taro Nohashi vs. Yoshinari Narita, FUTEN 12/19/2010

Quick FUTEN opening matches where two guys just blast each other may be among my favourite things in wrestling, and this one was totally awesome. Narita is a BattlARTS guy and he has gloves and kickpads and Nohashi has his hands an a really hard head and they lay hellish beatings on each other for 6 minutes. NARITA tagging Nohashi with fast punches and bloodying his mouth was great. Intially Nohashi tried to grapple with NARITA but by the end he tried to just knock him out with crazy headbutts to the head and face. You don’t see a monk vs. an MMA fighter everyday but this was tremendous.

Dramatic Deep Cuts

 

Kota Ibushi vs. Taro Nohashi, DDT 9/23/2007

NOHASHI SHOWCASE MATCH! Man, I am glad I had a hunch that I should watch this. I had no idea Nohashi was this awesome in 2007. This was the kind of performance that makes you fall in love with wrestling all over again. Nohashi doesn’t care that he’s stocky and doesn’t stand a chance against the better looking, taller, chiseled Ibushi, he was gonna go hard and do a bunch of awesome shit. Nohashi had a bunch of cool ways to attack Ibushis leg, a bunch of awesome old school spots weaved perfectly into a modern day juniors match. It meshes really well with Ibushis athletic style, so you’d have Nohashi do a thrust kick and Ibushi would kip up and right into a tight Octopus Stretch. Ibushis leg selling wasn’t very deep but you can do some spectacular stuff with Ibushi and they did that here but man Nohashi is so much cooler. Nohashi was also taking all of Ibushis stiff shoot kicks like a champ. Loved the Mandara Hineri variations from Nohashi, the crazy floor dropkick, the headbutts etc.. The man was on like no tomorrow that night, total hidden gem performance.

TAKA Michinoku vs. MIKAMI, DDT 5/4/2005

This is MIKAMIs comeback match, which means TAKA is a total piece of shit to him. TAKA won’t bump for a MIKAMI headscissor, he sidesteps a MIKAMI dive, he even blocks MIKAMIs 619 and kicks out of 1 after MIKAMI hits his big senton. So MIKAMI has to bring the fight if he wants to get anything in this match. Taka was really punishing Mikami too with his tight headlocks and headscissor neck crank, and his fancy jump kicks were hitting hard. He also kept MIKAMI scurrying for the ropes with his out of nowhere facelock attempts. The insta-tap finish was great, too. Really gnarly, hard fought, unique match where it felt like TAKA was channeling Fujiwara.

Sanshiro Takagi vs. Masa Takanashi, DDT 7/20/2008

DDT is this weird promotion that puts on a ton of filler and lame jokes but sometimes you get a creative gem. This was a T2P style match that works both as a parody and a serious attempt at the style. Takanishi is really smooth and Takagi is surprisingly adept at this. These two have Skayde-ish transitions down pat and bust out a bunch of cool holds before a smart finish occurs. Fun in the same way like the first time you saw Johnny Saint wrestle.

REAL BLOOD The Maximum 12/26/2022

 Keisuke Goto vs. Tomoki Hatano

Boxing Gloves: Raito Shimizu vs. Rocky Kawamura

Hiroshi Yamato vs. Ryo Inoue

Daisuke Kanehira vs. Shingo

Naoya Nomura & Yuma Aoyagi vs. Super Crafter U & Rikiya Fudo

Slightly disappointing card mostly because it was rather pro style and they wrestled in a ring. Opener was just a route rookie squash with Hatano getting some bits of not very impressive or spectacular token offense, and Goto hitting some fun offense but not really brutalizing Hatano enough to make it special. Shimizu vs. Kawamura didn't get much going in the first two rounds mostly because they tried to do some ill-fated grappling. It's a boxing gloves match stupid, just hit each other in the face instead of trying to tumble on the mat! The 3rd round was pretty fun though.

The best and most solid match by far was Yamato vs. Inoue. Yamato is a real workhorse and pretty much carried this match against a bland kicker with his cool submission work and suplexes. The last two matches were alright but could have been better. Shingo did some cool submissions and counters which made his match interesting while Kanehira was mailing it in. The main event was a pro style match and felt like wasted potential considering how awesome the last REAL BLOOD main event was. Fudo was cool but everyone else was pretty much going to the motions. I am gonna blame this one on a Christmas hangover. We need a real CAPTURE show again, isn't Nomura their champion or something? Please dial Kitahara.

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