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Selected matches from G1 Climax
Special BATTLE FIELD Yokohama Commercial Tape 9/23/93 Kanagawa Yokohama Arena (17,000 sellout) IWGP Junior Heavykyu Senshuken Jiai: Jushin Thunder Liger vs. Masao Orihara (WAR) |
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An interesting situation because the title match was used to put the champion over strong going into a non-title match three days later at Osaka Jo Hall. The opponent in that match was Black Tiger, who had beaten Tigermoto earlier in the show. He was at ringside scouting Liger, as this was to be their first singles match (of course, Liger had wrestled Eddy Guerrero before). Orihara wasn't a credible challenger, and this match really didn't entertain the notion that he had a chance of taking the title. Instead, he was just portrayed as a guy that could take a lot of punishment but still wouldn't consider giving up. Liger did just about everything here. Orihara was known for his sloppiness at this point, but everything was right on today. After a brief feeling out period, they broke into a hot sequence where Liger knocked Orihara silly with his shotei, but Orihara fired back with his dropkicks. Liger knocked Orihara to the floor and did a pescado. After a series of go-behinds, Orihara kicked Liger low and used his dropkicks to knock him to the floor where he tried to revenge with a pescado, but Liger mainly avoided it, causing Orihara to land hard on his knee. After Liger powerbombed Orihara on the floor, they went into the body of the match with Liger trying to work on the now injured knee. This made sense because most of Orihara's offense was generated by his ability to jump high. Orihara stopped Liger's initial attempt to damage the knee, holding onto the ropes when Liger tried a kneecap dropkick. This allowed Orihara to get a little offense in before Liger dominated him by exploiting the bad knee. The knee attack, of course, began when Liger hit the kneecap dropkick. Orihara did a good job of selling the knee with the exception of when he did the Tiger Mask backflip out of the corner. However, Liger cut him off so quickly with his abisegeri that it didn't matter. Orihara came back when he stopped Liger from doing a flying move by dropkicking him off the top rope to the floor. This gave Orihara the opening for his famous Orihara moonsault. Orihara could never really put anything together though. He wound up nearly getting pinned when Liger cut him off on the top with his nadare shiki no Frankensteiner. Liger proceeded to deliver two nasty Ligerbombs, but Orihara just kicked out. Orihara got a hope spot when he turned a nadare shiki no piggyback drop into a kaiten ebigatame, but Liger avoided his moonsault and Orihara's knee was further injured on the landing. Orihara got up holding his knee, so Liger used another kneecap dropkick to knock him right back down. Liger went right into a hizajujigatame, but Orihara was able to withstand the pain long enough to make the ropes. Liger came off the second rope with all his weight on Orihara then dragged him to the center and went into a figure 4. Orihara fought it for about 30 seconds, then stopped moving. He wasn't going to submit, but the pain was excruciating. The ref stopped it upon seeing him stop fighting, which "may have saved Orihara from a broken leg" but certainly broke Orihara's heart. Orihara immediately waved his hands and screamed "no!" but it was too late. If it was a legit match then I would complain about the stoppage, but the finish gave Orihara an out, which is something he needed since he never even came close to flash pinning Liger. This was just a really solid match. It's the kind of match that's easy to review because the each segment logically follows the next, and there wasn't a lot that was just there, although too much of the mat wrestling wasn't done in a way that it really advanced the match. The spots were ordered so they had purpose and actually meant something, the transitions were logical, and the match really flowed well. Given Orihara wasn't going to compete, it was probably the best match they could have had because everything made sense and it was so technically sound. The thing is I don't think you can give a huge rating to a match that was a glorified squash where no attempt was made to elevate Orihara to a level where at least for one day he could compete with the best. After the match Black Tiger hoped onto the apron and said, "I really hate to rain on your parade, but you know something? If that's all you got you're in a lot of trouble brother because come Osaka you're gonna need a lot more to come over me. Because you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna take those horns, I'm gonna tear them off your head, and I'm gonna stick 'em up where the sun don't shine buddy." Eddy was so much cooler before he was relegated to selling low blows for Chyna... 17:22
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