Indy BattlARTS

 

 

Ian Rotten vs. Josh Abercrombie, IWA Mid South 2/4/2005

Really good Ian Rotten methcook BattlARTS style match. I liked Josh Abercrombie quite a bit here, he went right for a leg ride on the ground and had a cool shoulder choke and pin attempts, so he clearly had some idea of what he was doing. He also hit these cool Regal-esque palm strikes on the ground, and wasn’t afraid of getting into a headbutt war with Ian. That said this was still largely the Ian show. Highlights include Ian locking in an awesome cobra twist on the ground, as well as almost dislocating Abercrombies shoulder with some unorthodox arm stretches. He also added some deathmatch fighter touches, such as kneeing Abercrombie in the balls or biting his way out of a choke. The match had several great Ian strikes, most outstanding being his big palm strike and the part where he just walked over and nailed Abercrombie with an Ikedaesque punt kick. Abercrombie taking a huge Orihara-esque bump into the chairs outside the ring and then eating a stiff lariat on the floor was great. The finish wasn’t as strong as the body of the match but Ian hitting a big fisherman buster like it’s a puro match was cool. It was also really cool how the crowd totally ate this match up and reacted to all the big strikes, 2005 was a magical time in indy wrestling.

 

Low Ki vs Homicide, USA Pro 2/16/2002

Another track from Low Kis amazing run of shoot-ish matches in 2002. Homicide works really well in this kind of match, like he is not a polished technical grappler, but he will put the pressure on you on the ground in ways that make it look like he's really dangerous to fight. Like Low Ki will try to pull guard and lock in an armbar and Homicide grabs his face and tries to push his forearm in his face. It makes for a convincing grappler vs street figher styles contrast, without Homicide coming across as incompetent. The little details such as Ki immediately going for the Dragon Sleeper and Homicide selling it as dangerous also add a lot. We get some fun character moments where Homicide challenges Ki to a macho standoff and rightfully gets his teeth kicked in. Second half had really cool neck crunching suplexes and scrappy tree of woe spots. Homicide does gangsta who busts out puro moves really well, although he may have over indulged a bit on the STF. There was one knee breaker spot that may have been improvized that was absolutely amazing. Goofy finish where they declare it a time limit draw at like 18 minutes caps it off nicely. Very good match in total.

2002 MOTY List

Assorted NEO

 

Kyoko Inoue vs Shinobu Kandori, NEO 4/3/2003

Kyoko was pretty much a clown at this point, but Kandori is so dangerous that she gets a serious match out of her. It's too bad there's not much Kandori footage from this time period because she was still an absolute beast through and through. Initially Kyoko wasn't being serious, so Kandori quickly starts beating her around the ring with awesome headbutts, stomps and palm strikes. Inoue gets serious  and starts giving it back to Kandori with cool out of nowhere crowbar lariats. All of Kandoris submissions still feel dangerous and they are extremely well timed. There was this amazing bit where Inoue tried to put an armbar on Kandori and Kandori reversed out of it, then gave Inoue this scolding bitchslap to teach her a lesson. Inoues reckless powerbombs also work for this kind of match. They worked this in a dingy little club and it's a testament to Kandori that she was able to make this feel like a big fight.

Mima Shimoda vs Azumi Hyuga, NEO 4/9/2003

Shimoda was drifting into irrelevancy at this point, but she could still go when she wanted to, and she was willing it here. Obviously credit goes to Hyuga too who was really pushing her opponent, but Shimoda made the match by adding a healthy dose of violence and pissed-offness to it. Hyuga did her usual stuff, but they made it insanely scrappy with tons of nasty face stomps and kicks. Even the usual stretching portion looked brutal and hate filled as they both tried to bend each other in half. Shimodas offense is great, her axe kicks land flush in Hyugas face and the rolling kicks were amazing. I also loved her just hurling a chair at Hyugas head in frustration. That chair/brawling stuff can often come across as rote in late period LCO matches but here it felt like Shimoda meant it. Hyugas jumping knees were plenty brutal as always and thanks to her the pace never slowed down. Loved her stomping on Shimodas face. It's weird how Hyugas act is kind of predictable but she keeps having great matches. Real sleeper match considering it's dark period joshi, but the sheer hatred makes this.

 

Momoe Nakanishi vs Misae Genki, NEO 8/14/2004

Very fun big vs little match. Genki is often sloppy but does a pretty great job here being a lumbering monster swinging at her faster opponent. Nakanishi was such a talented wrestler, she does a great job trying to outmaneuver her bigger opponent and coming from odd and unexpected angles. She was also quite hard hitting when it came to kicking some ass. Dug all her slick pin combos. Also lots of Genki absolutely ragdolling Nakanishi with suplexes and throws. Finishing run was all kinds of tricked out and fun, Nakanishi always makes things a bit more complex than your standard joshi match. Her suplexes on Genki were also amazing.

Titanes del Ring

 Recently discovered this amazing wrestling show from Chile. They have all these comic book style gimmicks on the show, with this amazing presentation as the studio looks like a coloseum and a live band does all the entrance themes. And the matches are worked kind of like I imagine an 80s version of WCW lucha to be. Short, to the point, a mix of cool rudo beatdowns and neat technico spots. These guys clearly know what they are doing and everyone takes amazing bumps, I wonder if this was an attempt to breathe some life into a dying wrestling territory.

Dracula vs Robin

This has to be 1981 or 1982, not exactly sure. They do a bunch of awesome stuff with Dracula being amazingly committed to his character with a bunch of evil choking and biting. They even find a way to make the old arm drag off the top rope spot make sense. Robin busts out a suicide dive and some amazingly swank headmare variations. Robin also does the same re-entry flip into the ring 3 times. There's also an attempted  suicide dive which is promptly no-sold. At one point Dracula gets thrown out and rightly goes to bite a kid in the crowd. Robin takes this with a proto-code red and we are off to a hot start here.

Dracula vs Gladiador Romano

This seems to be from the very first episode of the show. Great little match - Dracula is clearly an amazing wrestler. His beatdowns look really painful - the little kicks, the splashes and elbow drop to the legs etc, all great stuff. He also keeps busting out neat moves. We get a better look at the weird back rolling takedown into a senton thing he does, and he also has a really slick take over into a double leg lock. Gladiador Romano looked like a pretty decent wrestler too with lots of swank technico spots such as a cool headscissor where he climbs up his opponent. Finish was something to behold. I wouldn't mind seeing Dracula go at it with Negro Casa.

Dragon Chino vs Spiderman

This seems to be from a later episode, they now have a live band jamming and playing random movie themes through the matches. Dragon Chino is a guy doing a martial artist gimmick, and his stuff actually looks pretty great. His hip throws have amazing pop and he hits a pretty devastating thrust kick and has other cool stuff he can do with his kicks. Spiderman looks oddly fuzzy and has a sexy valet in an amazingly bad looking costume, I guess because of the economic Crisis hitting Chile in 1982 or something. Spiderman does a nice job moving spider-like around the ring and he has some cool shit too. Spiderman, overwhelmed with his opponents kicks starts grappling and this pisses Chino off and he goes for the mask. I can tell these two are amazing wrestlers simply by the way they work a basic knuckle lock pin. Spiderman comes back folding his opponent up and I wouldn't have minded to see these two going longe.

 

Rayo de Jalisco vs El Zorro

HOLY SHIT they have Rayo de Jalisco on this show? He bumps like a luchador and does lucha stuff so that might be really him, or maybe its Rayo Jr. This is technico vs technico and while it's nothing substantial it's a neat display of both guys doing their cool stuff for 5 minutes. Zorro also does the cool tilt a whirl headmare, I wonder if that was a Chile special. The both go KO when they go for flying headbutts at the same time which looked really nasty. Rayos second comes in drags him on top of Zorro and the ref counts the 3. Rayos second is also a luchador and I wonder if they were getting on a Chile vs Mexico feud. Nevermind, Batman runs in and saves the day.

Rayo de Jalisco & Rayo Azteca vs Batman & Robin

I guess this followed from the previous altercation? It's a bit weird to see the classical masks of the two Rayos opposite the comic hero looks of Batman & Robin. This is 2/3 falls, too. Wild match with everyone bumping around and never slowing down. Looks like a clip from an old lucha movie. R. de Jalisco (they call him Rayo Mexicano in this match so I guess it's the real guy) dives from the top to the floor. The Rayos take it 2:0, once with a cool 2 on 2 submission and then with a cool 2 on 2 pin. What a trip.

Gladiador Romano vs El Faraon

This was the most athletic of these matches I've seen so far. They did a bunch of flips and kip ups, and cool headscissors and armdrags. As a showcase of the more athletic spots of this style this was very cool. They also showed good prowress working some holds but there wasn't much of that. The match ends in a Romero Special that leads to a double pin which has to be the earliest instance I've seen of that.

Gladiador Romano vs El Gitano

Also highly athletic match with lots of cool flips and throws. Maybe better than the previous one since this had slightly better structure. Gitano brought some cool stuff to the table, including some wild bumps into the ropes. It also had a double pin finish, though from a different move that was pretty interesting. I'm not sure if we are just catching glimpses of what these guys did in longer more fleshed out matches on houseshows or if this is the peak of the style, but I am enjoying it.

Hanako Nakamori Matches

 

Hanako Nakamori vs Arisa Nakajima, JWP 10/26/2014

Hanako Nakamori has been uploading some cool matches to her channel. This was beastly, basically your typical joshi match upgraded with some insane stiffness. Nakamori looked great here punting the fuck out of Nakajima with disgusting kicks over and over. I also really liked her Takeshi Ono-esque submission where she tied up Nakajima really fast. Nakajima annoyed me a bit early on somewhat no-selling Nakamori, but other than that she was fine and fired back against Nakajimas kick onslaught. She put some nice viciousness in her stomps, including a nasty face wash, and had some brutal elbows. At one point she grabbed Nakamoris head and just waffled her with open hand strikes. Highlights include an absolutely disgusting punt kick that cracked Nakajimas nose, a big spot where they both punched each other in the face, Nakajima rattling Nakamori with a big face stomp of her own, an insane spot where Nakamori hits a backwards headbutt to Nakajimas face. I also like that they stayed under 15 minutes really giving you just the right dose. Nakajimas comebacks were actually well timed and believable. I just love a big match with this level of insane strikes.

Hanako Nakamori vs Leon, JWP 10/10/2011

These two had another match in 2011 which was really great, this was a few months later, and also really damn great. This was a hell of a lot more hatefilled, as they start out brawling right away, and they keep working the match with a ton of palpable disdain for each other. Nakamori has transformed into a kick padded slug machine and she was kicking the living hell out of Leon here. I’ve never noticed Leon as a hard hitter before but she came back hard against Nakamoris onslaught, connecting with some pretty violent knees and kicks of her own, really making sure to give her a taste of her own medicine. There was this moment where they both slapped the taste out of each others mouths with Leon almost cracking Nakamoris jaw as she came charging back, and a totally uncalled for headbutt to the back of the head during the finishing stretch. Leon is this really graceful wrestler, who makes cool use of her spear and has a really big dive and cool ways to build to her back submissions. Those were some very cool bits of graceful wrestling in the middle of such a violent slugfest. It reminded me a bit of Otani/Orihara, it’s not often you see this kind of junior wrestling mixed with such hatred and face shattering kicks and stubbornness. After some stubborn back and forth early the second half of the match was just an epic struggle. Joshi often feels like transitions can happen at random, that wasn’t the case here as both of them did a great job fighting back to control and cutting each other off in nasty ways. Nakamoris face kicks were and I dug how she makes use of the Brock Lock. Match got a bit overkillish but then again it was a rematch of a pretty big match earlier that year. Tremendous stuff regardless, I cannot commend these two enough.

Hanako Nakamori & Tomoko Mori vs Leon & Neko Nitta, JWP 3/10/2013

The dynamic between Nakamori and Leon holds up well. These two are just awesome together. I really dig Leon with her quickness, use of the spear and cool submissions, and she is great at getting kicked really hard by Nakamori. The other two wrestlers in the match were cool oddities to check out. Joshi is full of random names that just fly under the radar. I’ve never heard or seen of Tomoko Mori but apparently she has been around since 2001 being trained by Kaoru Ito. She was a pretty solid wrestler and in the second half of the match busted out some cool STOs and a really sweet judo supex. Nitta apparently made her wrestling debut at the age of 32 and she is doing a cat girl gimmick having a tail. The tail being pulled is an amusing heel spot and her spinning tail attack that caught her opponent in the face was pretty nifty. Other than that she moved very well around the ring and didn’t do any comedy aside from comical amounts of nya, I also liked her big spin senton, so I was perfectly fine with this Neko Nitta. This was brisk tag team action and with the combination of the great Nakamori/Leon dynamic and two odd unique fun wrestlers made for a really cool match overall.

The Last of Nori da Funky Shibiresasu

 

Nori da Funky vs Kengo Takai, Sportiva 10/10/2018

Matches like this represent the classic dilemma of Japanese wrestling: there’s a lot of really good shit, but also lots of questionable shit. Opening chain wrestling was really well done. After that Takai does a really long comedy spot giving a super long speech on the floor and the briefly wrestle on the floor. Then they transition right back to epic heavyweight wrestling. There is some no selling and at one point the camera freezes for a minute or so , but holy fuck these guys are dropping mad bombs on each other and did a great job keeping things interesting. Stiffness was there as both guys were hitting blistering chops and jaw loosening elbows. The finish was absolutely brutal with Takai scrambling Noris brain with some knees to the head and then hitting an absolutely disgusting lariat to the back of the head that turned Noris lights out. Not a flawless match but worth checking out.

Nori da Funky vs Fuminori Abe, Sportiva 10/17/2018

Noris last match in the SPORTIVA Arena. Abe acts disrespectful early on, so Nori punishes him with an ultra tight headlock. Pretty fun shooter vs. traditional pro wrestler contrast here, Abe was constantly punishing Nori with nasty kicks and knuckle punches, and Nori responded by chopping the shit out of him and trying to boot his head off. Abes work on Funkys leg was really good as he used a variety of holds and transitioned from one to another in smart fashion. Leg work wasn’t super important in the 2^nd half but also wasn’t blatantly no sold. Second half was really good big match stuff with an injured Nori struggling to hit his signature offense, both guys battling it out in stiff strike battles and some cool counters. Most importantly, Noris backdrops, boots and chops came across as annihilating Abe, and both guys absorbed some stiff punishment. Nori retired 2 days later and I wish he kept going. He certainly was one of the most interesting acts going and his consistency in big matches like this was fantastic.

Continueing to watch Mutoha and being amazed

 

Ho Death Min vs. Diablo, 3^rd Brand 3/11/2023

This is from 3^rd Brand which is like a brawling-focussed Mutoha side brand. Decreasing the stunt show aspect of modern hardcore wrestling and increasing scrappiness is a really good aesthetic and they pulled off what they aimed at beautfully. Right at the go the match feels unhinged as Ho Death Min comes in with a fucking machete. He has to be held back and Diablo jumps him. They make use of a bunch of weapons that are laying around and they do a really good using them in unique hurty ways. Diablo at one point lands several nasty jabbing hits with a kendo stick to Mins leg, he also tries to behead him with a shovel horror movie style at one point. What really makes the match is the tumbling they do between shots. Often in brawls guys hit with a weapon, then lazily walk to the next location for another spot. That wasn’t the case here as both guys were always fighting, rolling on the floor punching each other, trying to sweep a leg or get in a bite when they were down etc. The laptop destruction is fun because that laptop is probably like half of Mutohas budget. for such a long brawl this never dragged and always kept my attention, I was really invested in some of the super simple things they did like the double clothesline exchange on the floor and they keep the crazy moments coming such as Diablo trying to stab Min with a piece of plastic or fucking Leatherface doing a run in with a running chainsaw. The stipulation of the match is that you have to put your opponent in a big bag to win and it kind of really works in its goofiness. After the match we get more sleaze characters brawling including fucking Katsunari Toi coming out to hit people with a kendo stick. Diablo really works in these kind of seedy brawls and almost 60 year old Poison Sawada worked his butt off. Super fun unique match, I love the technical stuff but I also love that they are doing this kind of brawling. People should pay attention to the art of this stuff just like to the art of something like Arai/GENTARO.

Hiroshi Watanabe vs. Kazuhiko Matsuzaki, Mutoha 2/14/2016

Interesting match because Matsuzaki, while being “old school” is not exactly a technician who will do lengthy hold for hold stuff. And thankfully they worked the match just like that, resulting in a really cool contest. Matsuzaki works  this like an 80s or 90s New Japan heavyweight. He doesn’t want to play Watanabes game and instead tries to go the few impact moves that he has, clocking Watanabe with headbutts and kicks to break the holds. At one point he grabbed a tight headlock and then drove Watanabe hard into the mat with a big bulldog, which is something that pretty much nobody does anymore but it totally rules. Later, Matsuzaki would power out of an attempted Cobra Twist, sell how painful that hold was for his abdomen, then try to put the same hold on Watanabe only for sneaky technician to immediately reverse it and torque Matsuzaki some more. Matsuzakis kicks and headbutts don’t hit as hard as they did in 1993 but otherwise the man did very well. And Watanabe is perfect in this kind of match, too. This match didn’t have much mat wizardry, it was more about timing and struggle, and there was a complete lack of contrived sequences. Very nice stuff without trying to force an epic, this kind of wrestling is so good, give me a good story and a sense of struggle with some cool moments and I will be very happy.

 

Taro Yamada vs Konaka, Mutoha 7/5/2015

Terrific match, Mutoha at its very best. It’s a rounds match that begins in a fashion inspired by World of Sport matches, with both guys displaying slick counters and moving in and out of holds very swiftly, but it quickly becomes a tangled nightmare as both guys would tie each other up in increasingly esoteric ways. Yamada was an absolute monster here, he looked like a true master of the llave style, and he just does things that nobody else does. He was tying up Konaka in so many different ways here, but also putting lots of creativity into his set ups and escapes, it was an absolute onslaught. Yamada is very much the driving force for most of the match, just tying Konaka in knots, and it seems Konaka only survives because Konaka is a flexibility demon and he can be put into contortions that not many other wrestlers could stand being put in. Although Konaka has a few moments where he really catches Yamada and it feels like a big victory each time. Not only were the submissions mind blowing, but so were their escapes from them. It was a display of mat wizardry in the truest sense. They do 20 minutes of outstanding grappling before the fifth round of 5, at which point Yamada loses his cool and finally nails Konaka with that curb stomp he likes to use. After that the time was running out and each moment felt frantic. Really edge of your seat stuff with both guys displaying incredible technical proficiency and body control while maintaining a competitive aura. I have been watching technical matches from Europe, Japan, Mexico, America for 15 years now and this was as good as any that I’ve seen.

You can Always Watch Random Lucha Libre

 

Shu el Guerrero/Ultimo Guerrero/Guerrero de la Muerte vs Ultraman/Olimpico/Sendero (CMLL 3/13/98)

20 minutes of seamless, beautifully executed lucha libre. Gotta love how 1997-1998 just about everyone had their working boots on and was having awesome matches weekly. I mean I’ve never heard anyone praise Guerrero de la Muerte, but Guerrero de la Muerte looked like a fucking workhorse in this. Whole rudo team was awesome but he really went the extra mile, working some spectacular segments with Olimpico, really making sure to make his opponent look like a million bucks, then turning around, kicking ass and punching people in the face, before bumping even bigger and finally just ripping a guys mask off in a perfectly timed moment. Shu is always super enjoyable to watch bumping, puffing his chest, locking on weird submissions. They were already going hard in the first fall, culminating with a beautiful double dive from Olimpico and Ultraman. Apparently Sendero is a luchador from Peru and while he didn’t do anything super outstanding he was fun to see. The rudo beatdown was just tremendous, with all 3 guys always keeping things interesting. Ultimo Guerrero even managed to hit a cool dive fake in assholeish fashion. Pretty hot 3^rd fall. Sometimes, you just want to watch some good lucha libre.

Guerrero de la Muerte/El Arkangel vs Tigre Universario/Metalico (CMLL May 8th, 1993)

Really good, intense match for a bunch of undercarders. I checked this out for more Guerrero de la Muerte (who knows, it might not even be the same guy as in the 1998 match), but the Arkangel/Metalico matwork stood out. Both guys wrestled wrestled like they had something to prove. Hard resistance on leg trips etc, and gnarly throws interspersed with the grappling. I love when guys hit out of nowhere throws while exchanging holds and Arkangel absolutely drilled him with a huge rock bottom here. Guerrero then ate a spinebuster from Tigre which he sold as if it had given him a concussion. The rudos then proceeded to work a sneaky cut off which I loved. 2^nd fall was super unpredictable as they kept mixing up rudo beatdown and beautiful technico shine segments. Muerte didn’t do much in terms of wrestling but I really like how he always knows to time that right hand perfectly. LOVED the callback to the first fall when Muerte ate another devastating spinebuster. Rudos letting Tigre fly into nowhere and then finishing with a huge doomsday device was also quite the power move. Badass little match where they made everything count.