Quebrada #31

by Mike Lorefice (M.L.Liger@juno.com)

9/22/97

Gaea 9/20/97 Kawasaki Gym

Gaea ran the biggest show in the history of the promotion on 9/20, getting 4,300 fans for gross of around $155,000. I thought the show would sell out, but the arena was said to be about 93% full. It definitely hurt some that JWP had a very good lineup at Korakuen Hall on the same night. You have to figure some people will no show, so I’d say this was a near sellout and a major success, particularly since Gaea isn’t familiar with such undertakings. Gaea’s big shows in the past have been their monthly shows at Korakuen Hall, which regularly sellout, but a Korakuen sellout and gross is roughly ½ of what they did here. These figures show that the genre of women’s wrestling is not dead in Japan, rather the fans will come out if you give them something different and interesting.

The most important thing about this show seems to be the passing of the guard as to what league is the number one women’s promotion in the world. Gaea has far more stable financial backing than AJW and at least has more stable backing than JWP. Considering JWP's recent retirees, Gaea has the best crop of youngsters. Gaea not only has a full talent roster, but they have one with a low mean age. I think we’ve just witnessed the passing of the guard, as it seems that the top women’s promotion in the world right now is Gaea Japan.

With the exception of a terrible main event, this was said to be a great show. The one thing that held the show back was the typical problem with women’s wrestling, injury. Akira Hokuto, the premier performer in Gaea, was supposed to face Devil Masami in what would have been the first time the two have ever had a competitive singles match. Unfortunately, on 9/8, Hokuto, who was suffering from great pain in her breast, collapsed while working at her new clothing shop. Hokuto was hospitalized and the doctor said the problem was a nerve touching the bone. Luckily, Hokuto will only be out for a short time. Unfortunately, the timing of the problem was really bad, as it caused her to miss her biggest match of the year.

Chigusa Nagayo, working under her Zero gimmick, replaced Hokuto against Devil, defending the WCW women’s title for her. Hokuto has a history of turning her already super workrate up on big shows, so it was pretty much guaranteed that her match with Devil would have been a good one. If Chigusa wasn’t double booked, she probably could have had a good match with Masami. However, with Chigusa working twice and Devil & Chigusa both using their bad gimmicks, the match turned into a disaster.

The scheduled main event of the show was Chigusa vs. Aja Kong (freelancer) for the AAAW heavyweight title in their first ever singles match. This match turned out to be the 4th match of the 6 match show. I’m not sure what the original plan was, but I assume the match was shortened due to Chigusa having to work later on. In any case, this was a 10-minute sprint and a damn good one at that. The work was very stiff match and the match was chock full of power moves. The most surprising thing was Chigusa used Hokuto’s flip dive. In a recent tag match with Hokuto & Chigusa against Yamada & KAORU, Hokuto performed the flip dive then urged Chigusa to do the move. Chigusa was afraid at first, but eventually Hokuto coerced Chigusa to do it. Chigusa used this spot in her match later on against Devil as well. Aja hit her uraken early on, but instead of covering, she kicked several of her famous cans, which were lined up on two sides of the ring. They exchanged big moves such as backdrop drivers. Aja followed up her diving reverse elbow with her brainbuster. Aja "could have had the cover," but she opted to pull Chigusa up at two. Chigusa came back, hitting a splash mountain (Aja had climbed the ropes). Chigusa tried to use Aja’s own finisher, the uraken, on her, but Aja ducked it then urakened Chigusa. Chigusa made it to her feet at the 9 count, so Aja tried for another uraken. However, Chigusa ducked this one and jujigatame’d Aja for the win at 9:28. This was said to be a very exciting all action match. After the match, Aja got on the house mic and asked for a rematch. It was surprising that Aja did the job here, but Chigusa doesn’t like to do things the obvious way. It appears Aja will get her rematch and, if so, Chigusa will be the one jobbing in that one.

Kyoko Inoue (freelancer) took on Meiko Satomura in the best match on the show. Chigusa Nagayo may be a lot of things, but she’s definitely not stupid, especially when it comes to handling her protégé Satomura. This was a veteran vs. promising rookie style match at it’s finest, with Kyoko giving Satomura a lot and allowing Satomura to get over before doing the inevitable job. This was not what Kyoko and the other AJW veterans have been doing with the AJW youngsters, as in barely selling for them and beating them in 4 minutes, rather the match seemingly followed the established pattern that makes the youngster come out of the match as a star, while the veteran’s reputation stays intact. Satomura was her typical self, playing the excitable, fiery, antsy youngster. Satomura came out like a house of fire, attacking Kyoko early with forearms and her bizarre windmill forearm spot (she whips her opponent into the corner then charges, flapping her arms on the way, before delivering a forearm). When Satomura tried the windmill forearm again, Kyoko cut her off with a kick. Kyoko then did the traditional attempt to calm the youngster down. Kyoko used a vicious lariat then mocked Satomura by imitating the windmill forearm spot. Kyoko hit most of her trademark moves, including more lariats that nearly turned Satomura inside out. When Satomura was on offense, she worked over Kyoko’s arm, hoping to be able to finish the veteran with her jujigatame. One highlight saw both women jump off the ring apron with Satomura turning it into a wakigatame in midair. Later, Kyoko tried her diving reverse elbow, but Satomura cut her off and did her trademark jujigatame off the 2nd rope. Kyoko toyed with Satomura at various points during the match, forcing the youngster to prove herself. One such spot saw Kyoko dare Satomura to hit her and when she did, Kyoko no-sold the blows until Satomura hit her in the face to gain the advantage. Finish saw Satomura hit two of her Death Valley bombs, but Kyoko kicked out at two. Satomura tried for a third Death Valley bomb, but Kyoko slipped out and hit an awesome Dangerous released German suplex. Kyoko then used her Niagara Driver to pin Satomura at 16:28. Kyoko carried Satomura back to the dressing room on her back, which is a sign that Satomura earned Kyoko’s respect. A really good match. Chalk another one up for Chigusa as Satomura is now one step closer to imminent stardom and greatness.

Sugar Sato faced Yoshiko Tamura (freelancer) in a match for Tamura’s WCW women’s cruiserweight title. This match was part of the agreement AJW and Gaea made when Gaea allowed Tamura to win "their" title. Tamura will be working with JWP as a freelancer and she’ll probably be joining that promotion at a later date, so we might not be seeing her work for Gaea at all or at least not very much from this point forward. Sugar had a new look here, as she sludged her hair brown and wrestled in Ozaki’s red outfit. Sugar, of course, played heel, refusing to shake Tamura’s hand before the match. Tamura was given most of the offense in this match, doing her suplexes and missile kicks, because she was the one that was jobbing in the end. Sato instilled her typical psychology, working over Tamura’s legs to set up her Dragon screw to figure four combination. Sato won the match and the title at 18:25 with Ozaki’s Ligerbomb finisher. Tamura wanted to congradulate Sato after the match, but heels want no part of such actions. This was said to be a good match that was enjoyable, but not particularly exciting. The main drawback of the match was sloppiness. Having Sato win the title here was another smart move by Chigusa. Sato & Satomura are her two most promising youngsters and, though it was done through different means, both were elevated in the minds of the fans through this show.

Zero (Chigusa), put Hokuto’s WCW women’s title on the line against Super Heel Devil Masami (JWP). The Super Heel gimmick is Devil doing the Undertaker gimmick, and it works even worse in women’s wrestling. This match was just terrible, or at least what you could see of it was terrible. Glenn said, "During this whole match, they kept the lights flickering, presumably so the customers would not be able to visually witness this debacle." The "match" was mainly contested in the crowd with chairs being scattered all over the place. Eventually Chigusa tried a powerbomb, but Devil countered it and rolled her up for the pin at 12:31. Devil is the new WCW women’s champion. What could be seen of the action was said to be very deliberate. The highlight of the match was said to be the finish. I don’t mean that the finish was good, rather that the match was over so the torture had ended.

The opener was Chikayo Nagashima & Rina Ishii & Sakura Hirota vs. Makie Numao & Maiko Matsumoto & Hiromi Kato. This was said to be an okay opener. There were lots of basic moves like dropkicks early, but it picked up toward the finish with near falls and saves. The highlight of the match was Ishii, who did her nice huracanrana and a unique somersault type neckbreaker on Matsumoto. Ishii is pretty small, but she’s a good athlete who has recently been showing good potential. The lowlight of the match was Nagashima sustaining a head injury. She continued to work, though she was curled up by the ropes writhing in pain toward the end of the match. The finish saw Nagashima hold Numao while Hirota delivered a diving hip attack. Nagashima followed with a German suplex then Hirota covered Numao for the win at just over 20 minutes.

The third match was scheduled to be Nagashima & KAORU vs. Toshiyo Yamada & Sonoko Kato, but due to her injury, Nagashima was replaced by Hirota. KAORU & Nagashima would have been the underdogs, but when you replace Nagashima with the lower ranked and considerably worse Hirota, it would seem KAORU’s team had no chance of winning. Hirota, as usual, mainly sold, taking stiff kicks from Yamada. Kato did some hot moves, including a Super fall away slam and a Dragon suplex. Since Hirota has an AJW rookie like move set, KAORU was called on to do almost all the offense for her team. With Hirota holding Yamada outside the ring, KAORU gave Yamada a gorgeous Orihara moonsault. Hirota held Yamada at bay while KAORU went into the ring and Excalibured Kato then hit an in ring quebrada for the win at about 15 minutes. Pretty big upset considering that KAORU hasn’t even been getting pushed lately. Said to be a pretty good match with a lot of stiff moves.

Many thanks to Tsunekawa-san for his detailed report

FMW 9/28/97 Kawasaki Stadium

FMW will run it’s biggest show of the year, entitled "Over the Legend Kawasaki" on 9/28 at Kawasaki Stadium. The league went all out, getting big names from major offices to appear on the show, but they haven’t promoted the card very well at all. Unlike when Onita was running the show, it appears FMW didn’t sign the fire waives that would allow them to put more fans in the building. It doesn’t sound like the fire waivers will matter much though since this show won’t even come close to the 50,000 plus they got on 5/5/94 and 5/5/95, rather this will draw similar to 5/5/96, as in the 33,000 range.

The main event is Atsushi Onita vs. Yukihiro W*ING Kanemura in a "Cage Bomb, Super Real 15-minute Time Bomb Explosion Death Match." This is the first time these two have ever fought in singles. This is the 5th time FMW has used the cage bomb stipulation. The other four were; 9/23/91 Kawasaki Stadium-Onita beat Tarzan Goto, 8/22/93 Hyogo Nishinomiya Stadium-Onita beat Mr. Pogo, 5/5/94 Kawasaki Stadium-Genichiru Tenryu beat Onita forcing Onita to "retire", & 5/5/95 Kawasaki Stadium-Onita beat Hayabusa in Onita’s "retirement match." You can guarantee that the crowd will be really into this match. I think it will be a fair death match, while Zach Arnold thinks it will be a tremendous death match. Onita’s been doing the same thing for so many years that I don’t know if he’s willing to do a "new" storyline. Since it’s a time bomb cage match, there’s a good chance that the match will have fairly good build and maybe even good psychology. I basically expect Onita to do the same thing he’s been doing for years, which is get destroyed, make a quick comeback and beat Kanemura just before the time bomb goes off, then use his body to shield the ref from the explosion, and do the usual post match ritual. Onita fans would probably be happy to see this, but I can’t get excited about it anymore. It’s a given that both men will take sick bumps and a lot of blood will be spilled, but we’ll have to wait and see how good or bad this turns out to be.

In what should be the best match on the show, Masato Tanaka will face The Gladiator for Gladiator’s Independent World title. Tanaka is not only the best worker in the promotion, but he’s the best at working with Gladiator. Tanaka will take all kinds of crazy bumps for Gladiator, which most likely includes being powerbombed over the top rope through a table again. Tanaka usually loses to Gladiator, but he’s the guy who’s being groomed as Onita’s successor and the future top star in the promotion, so I’m quite sure he’s going over this time. Gladiator also holds the World Brass Knucks title, so even if he loses, he still has a heavyweight title. Tanaka and Gladiator always have very good matches and I don’t see this being an aberration.

Hayabusa & Jinsei Shinzaki (Michinoku Pro) will meet Kenta Kobashi & Maunakea Mossman (both All Japan) in maybe the most interesting match of the show. This is the first time Kobashi has ever fought an interpromotional match outside of AJ rings. Hayabusa is going to have to be good here because he’s going to have to go most of the way for his side. If it wasn’t for Shinzaki, this would surely be a very good match, but with Shinzaki there’s no guarantees. It appears that AJ will get the win and prove their superiority. I think Shinzaki will do the job, but he hardly does any jobs, so this might be a bad prediction. I just can’t see FMW allowing Hayabusa to job on their biggest show of the year. Mossman would be the most logical job boy, but that means All Japan would be giving Hayabusa & Shinzaki wins at Budokan Hall & Kawasaki Stadium in return for Hayabusa jobbing to Akiyama earlier in the day at Korakuen Hall. I don’t think this is likely since AJ is the bigger promotion, thus they should be the one calling the shots. Zach thinks that, if the FMW team loses, Hayabusa will be the one who does the job.

Ken Shamrock (WWF) takes on Vader (WWF) in a UFC No Holds Barred Match. This match will take place inside a special UFC cage. The match will still be worked, with Shamrock most likely going over, but this stipulation will give it more of the "aura of legitimacy." I think that maybe half the fans in the arena will care about this match. Garbage wrestling and shooting are basically the opposite ends of the spectrum, and although there are many fans of both, there are also many fans who like one or the other. There is definitely a stigma that will prevent some fans of "real wrestling," from attending this "garbage" show. Some fans might be really into this, but I don’t think this is going to get any fans who like UWF style and not FMW style to attend the show. These guys are capable of having a very good match together. If it’s booked right, this should be one of the highlights of the show, but there hasn’t been a Shamrock match that’s been booked right since he joined the WWF. Seeing the how the fans react to this, both because it’s a different style and because of what Shamrock did to NJ earlier in the year, may be the most interesting aspect of the match.

Aja Kong (freelancer) takes on The Lowest Form of Life Shark Tsuchiya for the vacant WWA and Independent women’s titles. The stipulations for this match are that there are no rules, no officials, no holds barred, and all weapons are allowed. Yumi Fukawa will be in Aja’s corner and Eagle Sawai will be in Shark’s corner. This match may be pretty bad, but it should be pretty interesting. The main question is will Shark finally do some selling and bump taking, or will she somehow get Aja to play Megumi Kudo and bleed and take all the bumps in the match. A secondary question is will Shark actually take some stiff blows for once. Most likely Shark will take a few stiff shots and Aja will do more selling than normal. If not, Aja will quickly crush Shark. I’m pretty sure Aja is going to win the titles here. FMW needs to do something to create interest in their women’s division and Aja could do that, at least for the short hall. The chances this match will be good are slim, while the chances this match will stink up the joint are quite high. Looking at Fukawa could easily be the highlight of the match.

Terry Funk (F.M.W.) takes on Fuyuki (Fuyuki-gun) of the many first names in a NWA Texas title match. This match has bad written all over it. Both these guys are simply washed up, but I don’t think these two will work very well together either. I have a hard time picturing Funk putting up with Fuyuki’s comedy routine, although Fuyuki is better than the likes of the Junkfood Dog, but I guess that’s what we’ll be seeing. Funk goes over in a poor match.

Hisakatsu Oya & Mr. Gannosuke will defend their World Brass Knucks tag titles against Jado & Gedo (Fuyuki-gun). Oya & Gannosuke won the titles from W*ING & Hido on 8/21 in Yokosuka. This should be a fair match. I figure Fuyuki’s cronies will win because they won’t lose both matches on the show and there’s almost no chance Fuyuki will beat Funk. Oya will probably be called on to job since it’s a big show.

There will be a 13-man "100,000 Yen (roughly $850) Street Fight Royal Rumble." Koji Nakagawa, Ricky Fuji, Tetsuhiro Kuroda, Mr. Pogo II, & Hayato Nanjyo will be FMW’s representatives. Hideki Hosaka & Hido will represent W*ING. Super Leather, Flying Kid Ichihara, & The Head Hunters will represent F.M.W. Alexander Otsuka & Minoru Tanaka will represent Battlarts. Basically it’s 11 undercarders that are all really FMW wrestlers plus the two Battlarts workers. This could be kind of interesting or it could be really boring.

The opener will be a women’s tag match, but the participants haven’t been announced yet.

Someone Should Have Told The Matsunaga Brothers Greed is BAD!

All Japan Women, the longest standing of the current wrestling promotions in Japan, is on life support. The many problems with the way the promotion has been run have been documented here and elsewhere many times, but none of those problems are the heart of the reason the promotion may not survive long enough to see it’s 30th anniversary. The main reason for the demise seems to be that the owners, the Matsunaga Brothers, couldn’t be content with just getting rich off wrestling. Instead, they got real greedy and they literally went from the penthouse to the outhouse.

The route of the problem seems to be that AJW made too much money in the late 1980's, with the Crush Gals & Dump Matsumoto, and again in the early 1990's when the next generation, lead by Akira Hokuto, Manami Toyota, Bull Nakano, & Aja Kong, got over. It’s kind of impossible for a company to literally be too profitable, but figuratively it seems they were.

At some point, the Matsunaga Brothers, who started the promotion in 1968 and have run it ever since, had a lot of extra money, but still coveted more. They decided to use their riches to branch out of the wrestling business into both real estate and a health food Ramen house restaurant chain. The Ramen house failed miserably.

The real estate business apparently was initially successful, leading to the Matsunaga’s pooring a ton of their money, which is really the same as AJW’s money, into it. Unfortunately, the real estate "bubble" period ended about 5-6 years ago and since then real estate prices have dropped tremendously. The result of the real estate business going South is that the Matsunaga Brothers used their AJW money to prop up the real estate business. AJW money wasn’t close to enough though, so they started taking out considerably loans from the bank. The combination of all the bank loans and the real estate business failing to rebound put them in tremendous debt. It wasn’t only the real estate business that was failing though. The wrestling company might still be somewhat profitable, but AJW isn’t even making close to what it was just one year ago. However, if the Matsunaga’s would have protected their riches, investing the money in something a bit safer than what they chose, or even just not going so heavily into real estate, they would have had plenty of money to withstand the inevitable down periods that come every time the generation of women that are over retire.

One of the problems on the wrestling side is that the Matsunaga’s spread themselves too thinly by trying to promote their ridiculous 250 shows per year. With AJW presenting stale lineups instead of new stars, the fans didn’t care about attending the spot shows. During the promotions best period, they had no trouble selling the shows to local promoters, and for good money at that. However, when attendance fell, the local promoters weren’t as interested. Some of them simply paid AJW less money for the shows, but others stiffed AJW when the shows drew poorly or they passed on AJW all together. Instead of cutting down the schedule, the Matsunaga’s made the decision to promote more and more spot shows on their own. They couldn’t do as good a job as the local promoters though, not only because they spread themselves so thin by running so many shows, but because the local promoter knows his market better than an outsider does.

The amount the Matsunaga Brothers are in debt is said to be a ridiculous $22,000,000. Yeah, that many zeros. To make things worse, the Matsunaga’s not only can’t afford to make payments on the principle, but they can’t even make full payments on the interest. Thus, every month they are getting further and further in debt.

Along with not being able to pay the interest to the bank, the Matsunaga Brothers haven’t paid any of their employees since March. The result of this, and to a lesser extent the culmination of the many other problems, has lead to one women after another leaving the promotion.

The first departure was Toshiyo Yamada on 7/13. Aja Kong & Kyoko Inoue left the promotion after the 8/20 Budokan Hall show. Rie Tamada & Yumi Fukawa, both followers of Aja, decided to leave at that time as well, although they didn’t officially leave until 9/5. Yoshiko Tamura, Aja’s follower, along with Misae Genki & Tanny Mouse, who are Kyoko followers, announced they would leave on 9/4. Mariko Yoshida, who was out with an injury, announced she would leave on 9/8. Mima Shimoda, Etsuko Mita, Saya Endo (who’s Shimoda & Mita’s follower), Chaparrita ASARI, & Yuka Shiina all left after the 9/21 Kawasaki Gym show. Referee Daichi Murayama & ring announcer Yoshitada Okita will leave in October. So the departure count is up to 14 wrestlers, 1 ring announcer, and 1 referee, all in a matter of 9 weeks.

The biggest blows to the promotion are the departures of Mima Shimoda, Etsuko Mita, & Chaparrita ASARI. While Aja & Kyoko are bigger stars, Aja was clearly being phased down and it seemed Kyoko might be heading down the same path given that she had two runs with the WWWA title that failed to draw any decent houses.

Shimoda & Mita were two of the only good performers left, but more importantly, they had new life since their heel turn because that was the only "new" thing in the promotion. Shimoda & Mita were having the best and most interesting matches on the shows of late. They were basically the life blood of the promotion because they were feuding on top with the Hotta’s U*TOPS group, which consists of every remaining star but Toyota & Takako. Now the U*TOPS are basically dead because that group is more than 1/3 of the entire AJW roster. I mean, you can still have the group, but what good will they be when there’s no one to program them against.

ASARI was the only younger women who could live up to whatever push they gave her. She was ready for a big push by the end of 1996, but injury kept her out almost the entire first 7 months of the year. Now that she returned, AJW probably could have elevated her to headline status. Without her, AJW has no youngsters to push other than Maekawa, who simply cannot live up to her push, and Momoe, who will be very good some day, but she’s not experienced enough to be ready yet. Basically my point is that it would have been ok for AJW to scale down for a while they were rebuilding, but without ASARI, they really don’t have anyone to rebuild around.

The Matsunaga’s were forced to put the company headquarters, which has the wrestlers dorms, along with the gym, a restaurant, and the business office, up for sale. One of the only reasons the women have been able to get by without pay for all these months is that they live in the company building. If the building is sold, I assume they are all going to have to find new places to live, which is going to cost everyone money. The Matsunaga’s have already compromised their own lifestyle due to their financial woes, selling their houses and moving into apartments.

A big problem that the Matsunaga’s are faced with is that bankruptcy in Japan is different than bankruptcy as we know it. If the Matsunaga’s declare bankruptcy, they would be prohibited by Japanese law from starting a business for three years (though there are loopholes so they might be able to start up again if they got a new investor and put the company in their name). Thus, AJW would cease to exist for three years and by then, they would have no employees and basically have to start everything from scratch.

AJW’s roster now consists of Manami Toyota, Yumiko Hotta, Takako Inoue, Kaoru Ito, Tomoko Watanabe, Kumiko Maekawa, Momoe Nakanishi, Nanae Takahashi, Miho Wakizawa, Miyuki Fujii, and a rookie that’s yet to debut named Nakahara. Nakahara, who I’m told is going to be the only member of AJW’s class of 1997, was supposed to debut in about a month, but she broke her shoulder. Manami Toyota is the best there is and the best there was, but who’s left for her to work great matches with? This group is clearly worse than JWP and Gaea and the gap is only going to widen as the Kuzumi’s, Satomura’s, and Sato’s of the world are just getting better and better.

Referee Bob Yazawa, real name Futoshi Matsunaga (he’s the son of one of the Matsunaga Brothers) is the groups trainer. Yazawa knows karate, amature wrestling, and martial arts, but has no experience as a pro wrestler. To say the least, he’s a far cry from the groups former trainer, the legendary Jaguar Yokota.

11 women is an extremely low number to try to run a promotion like AJW with because there’s always going to be a few women who are out with injuries. With the incredibly small crew, AJW has been double booking the women. This is a very bad thing for AJW to have to do because it’s going to lead to ever more injuries and it’s going to take even more time off the veteran's careers. With literally nothing on the horizon, AJW absolutely can’t afford to lose another wrestler, whether it be to injury or retirement or the freelance route.

There have been several rumors about new women’s promotions starting up in Japan. One rumor is that Rossi Ogawa, who aside from the Matsunaga’s was maybe the highest ranking executive in the company, will start a promotion with satellite tv money. Other rumors are that Aja and/or Kyoko will find money backer(s) and start up their own promotion(s). If a new promotion starts, it will most likely consist of many of the women who left AJW. If not, many of the women who left may have to find a new way to make a living because there hasn’t been a lot of interest in most of them. Aja & Kyoko can get bookings and Tamura & Tanny Mouse will work with JWP. I’m sure Shimoda, Mita, & ASARI will be able to get work, but the rest are all much more questionable. Most of them aren’t big stars and don’t have any drawing power, so the other promotions don’t have a lot to gain by booking them.

The most pathetic thing is that if AJW had only been marginally profitable all these years, they would probably be in pretty good shape right now. If they weren’t making much money, the Matsunaga’s wouldn’t have had the money to invest in outside interests. Thus, it’s likely they would never have lost their fortunes on real estate because they wouldn’t have had a big enough fortune to initially engage in that endevor.

AJW may be able to survive, but they will need something they haven’t had in what seems like an eternity if they are going to ascend back to greatness before the next century, luck.

All Japan ’97 Giant Series Tour

The next tour, ’97 Giant Series, kicks off on 9/28 at Korakuen Hall. This show starts before FMW’s Kawasaki Stadium show, allowing Kobashi, Maunakea Mossman, & Hayabusa to work this show. Hayabusa will be teaming with Misawa against Jun Akiyama & Satoro Asako. One can only assume that Hayabusa’s team will split on 9/28. Since Hayabusa & Jinsei Shinzaki beat Kenta Kobashi & Kentaro Shiga on 9/6 at Tokyo Budokan Hall, I’m thinking that Hayabusa’s team is going to win the match at Korakuen with Asako being the clear job boy. It kind of surprises me that FMW would allow Hayabusa’s team or maybe even Hayabusa himself to lose on their major show of the year. When you work with larger promotions, especially when you need their workers to help draw a big crowd, you are going to have to make booking concessions though. Kobashi’s match is a 6-man teaming with Mossman & Ace against Kawada & Taue & Ogawa. Ace will probably work a good deal since Kobashi & Mossman have to work later on.

9/29 in Matsumoto has Misawa vs. Gary Albright in a non-title match. This match was set up on 8/26 in Sapporo when Albright ridiculously pinned Misawa in the main event tag title defense at just 8:42. I would like to know why Steve Williams is getting the title shot with Misawa instead of Albright. I get it, we needed to see Albright pin Misawa to set up a non-title match, but Williams, who hasn’t had any notable singles matches in months, just gets a title shot. I understand that AJ rotates challengers for the Triple Crown and Williams, unfortunately, is still a member of that rotation, but why not have him pin Misawa if he was going to get the next title shot. The only good reason I can think of it that Williams pinned Misawa in their Champion Carnival match and they haven’t met in singles since. Misawa will clearly beat Albright, but this won’t be anything special. Since it’s Misawa, it’ll probably at least be good, but Gary has been so bad this year that even Misawa might not be able to carry him. This show also has Kobashi vs. Akiyama, which should be a great match, so even if Albright bites, the card shouldn’t be too bad. Then again, the other main match is Johnny Ace vs. Steve Williams.

10/11 in Fukuoka will be the Misawa vs. Williams title match. The last Triple Crown match between these two was on 3/1/97 at Budokan and it was well below the level that fans have come to expect from Triple Crown matches. I doubt this match will be much better, if any better, but maybe Williams isn’t abusing pain killers anymore. If so, maybe he’ll actually respond to the opportunities and openings Misawa gives him at least once in a while. In any case, Williams is in even worse physical condition then he was in March, so this could verge on embarrassing. I don’t see how this match could be a very good match and I have serious doubts that it will even be a good match. Misawa will clearly be victorious, but he’s really got his work cut out for him trying to carry two dead weight opponents in main event singles matches on this tour. This show also has Kawada & Taue vs. Kobashi & Ace, so again there’s the guarantee of one really good match. The match these four did on 5/26/97 in Sapporo was great, though I fear I may have overrated it a tad.

The final night of the tour is 10/21 at Tokyo Budokan Hall. This is AJ’s 25th anniversary show, so they will be looking to make it a special show. Misawa is headlining in singles again, but this one is guaranteed to be excellent since he’s facing Kobashi. Right now this is a non-title bout, but it’s expected that it will be changed to a title match once Misawa beats Doc on 10/11. In my opinion, there have been two ***** matches this year and one of them was Misawa vs. Kobashi on 1/20. I don’t think they will top that match, I mean I’ve seen at most two men’s heavyweight singles matches that have topped it, but this should be at least a ****3/4 match. Kobashi scored his first even singles pin on Misawa on 3/28/97 in Nagaoka. I don’t expect him to get his second singles pin here, or his first title win over Misawa if they add that stipulation. It doesn’t look like we’ll be seeing another Misawa vs. Kawada match this year since the World's Strongest Tag League is up next. My guess is what they are doing with this tour is giving Misawa his last big run of this Triple Crown reign, having him finish off all the Triple Crown contenders in the rotation (Kobashi is the only one in the rotation he hasn’t defended against in this reign), before having him drop the title to Kawada in their next meeting. It would have been more fitting for the 25th anniversary show to be Kawada’s first title win over Misawa because their legendary series of title matches began 5 years ago to the month, as part of AJ’s 20th anniversary show. The problem is that they did Misawa vs. Kawada matches at Budokan Hall on 4/19/97 & 6/6/97, so it’s too soon to do another one. There’s really no reason that they couldn’t have had Kenta get his shot in June and Kawada get his shot on this show though. I think old age is catching to the Baba family and it’s starting to show in more ways than one.

Also on the anniversary card is Kawada vs. Yoshihiro Takayama of Kingdom. If Takayama didn’t suck enough before, now he’s gotten out of shape. Kawada is the only wrestler that ever had a very good match with Takayama. That match wasn’t included on the 9/11/96 UFW-I Jingu Stadium commercial tape (this had nothing to do with the quality of the match), so I’m still very much in doubt that it was as good as it was said to be. I don’t see much that they can do here. Kawada is never going to lose to this guy, and everyone knows it. Unless Kawada gives Takayama enough that he can look credible enough to allow them to run a rematch, this should be it for their "feud."

Sasaski, More Sasaki, Still more Sasaki, Even more Sasaki, and Undoubtedly There’s More Sasaki To Come

To Say Kensuke "Choshu #2" Sasaki is in the midst of the biggest push of his career would certainly be an understatement. On 8/3, Sasaki won the G-1 Climax singles tournament for the first time in his career. He followed that up winning the IWGP tag titles, with his new partner Kazuo Yamazaki, from Manabu Nakanishi & Satoshi Kojima on 8/10 at the Nagoya Dome. NJ’s next major show was 8/31 at Yokohama Arena and, on a show that was honoring his mentor Riki Choshu, Sasaki captured the promotion’s most coveted prize, the IWGP title, from Shinya Hashimoto.

Sasaki continued what, as far as winning major events has to be the "greatest" two month run in the history of the promotion, by capturing the G-1 Climax Series tag tournament. Sasaki’s road to the finals saw him and partner Yamazaki defeat Masa Chono and his mystery partner, which turned out to be very uneventful since it wound up being NWO Sting, in the quarterfinal on 9/13. On 9/19, Hashimoto & Yamazaki defeated Hashimoto & Tadao Yasuda in the semifinal. The duo met the Great Muta & Hiroyoshi Tenzan in the final on 9/20. The match showed that Choshu’s booking is becoming more and more American style, as they did a screw job in the final. What happened was Muta & Tenzan broke up during the match, with Muta causing Tenzan to lose by spewing mist in his face. Yamazaki immediately capitalized by applying his jujigatame and Tenzan submitted at 15:21. You can bet this whole tournament sucked.

Sasaki’s push is guaranteed to continue as he’ll get his first win over his mentor Choshu in Choshu’s retirement match on 1/4/97 at the Tokyo Dome. You can guarantee that this win will only elevate Sasaki to a higher level and ensure he will be pushed to the moon for as long as fans pay to see the product.

Sasaki was traditionally the lowest rated of the "new generation" stars that Choshu pushed (behind Hashimoto, Muto, & Chono). With Choshu retiring, it’s quite apparent that this will no longer be the case and that Sasaki will basically be programmed in the same way Choshu was when he was still dominating the wrestling side of the company. Many have questioned Sasaki’s drawing power, but NJ is on such a phenomenal run at the box office that it appears they can do no wrong. Aside from the juniors, NJ has presented absolute crap all year, yet they have already had more big shows and huge houses than they did in any previous year and there’s still more than three months to go. Sasaki’s megapush ensures one thing, bad and boring matches will invade your tv set for years to come.

Plum Mariko Benefit Show

JWP will hold the Plum Mariko benefit show on 10/30. The event is taking place at Tokyo Ota Ward Gym, which is near the area where Plum grew up. All proceeds from the show are will be donated to Mariko’s family.

The show is supposed to consist of 7 or 8 matches, however, there won’t be any interpromotional matches on the show. Instead of interpromotional matches, JWP, AJW, JD, FMW, IWA, SPWF, Big Japan, & maybe LLPW will each send one match. I assume there are no interpromotional matches because JWP wants the other leagues to cooperate and they don’t want any controversy.

There is already controversy though because LLPW is threatening to pull out of the show. LLPW cites two reasons for wanting to pull out. The first is that they claim JWP announced that they would participate before they agreed to it. It’s believed that this is not the case. The second reason is a terrible one. LLPW is basically calling JWP liars by saying that it’s doubtful that they will indeed give all the proceeds to Plum’s family. Even if they believe this to be the case, I can’t believe they would ever let that one out of closed doors.

The actual reason that LLPW is threatening to pull out is that it seems they want to have interpromotional matches with JWP. By threatening to pull out, they are probably more apt to get JWP to negotiate with them. However, the way they are going about this is in such bad taste that I imagine they are only making the already bad relations between the two promotions that much worse. The sad thing is, Plum was not only one of the few JWP wrestlers who was still on good terms with LLPW, but she was still friends with many of the LLPW workers. LLPW accuses JWP of trying to profit off Plum’s death, yet it appears that they are the ones looking to strike up a series of interpromotional matches so both leagues can pop a crowd. Sounds pretty hypocritical to me.

JWP wanted Gaea to be involved in the show, especially since Plum had a good match with Chigusa a few years back, but Gaea turned them down due to a scheduling problem.

AJW 9/21 Kawasaki Gym

AJW drew an announced 4,100 to Kawasaki Gym on 9/21, the day after Gaea ran the same building. If the attendance is close to legit, which I doubt, the show would be a success because that’s about 400 shy of a sellout. However, with the departing Mima Shimoda & Etsuko Mita being a key to drawing the crowd, even a near full house can’t be looked at very positively.

The main event was a steel cage elimination match with Kaoru Ito & Tomoko Watanabe defeating Shimoda & Mita in a steel cage match to win the WWWA tag titles. The stipulations of the match, which was the first cage match AJW had run in nearly 6 years, where that both members of a team had to escape from the cage in order to win. Watanabe was the first to escape, getting out at 23:12, which left Ito to go it alone. Mita then evened things up, escaping at 25:03. This left Shimoda against Ito, which saw Ito do her diving footstomp OFF THE TOP OF THE CAGE then escape at 26:59. This was said to be an interesting tremendous match, easily the best on the show.

The other key match saw Manami Toyota go to a 30:00 draw with WWWA champion Yumiko Hotta in a non-title match. Aside from one match on 9/3/95, Toyota vs. Hotta is never that good and this was said to be no exception to that rule.

Sugar Sato & Chikayo Nagashima were scheduled to defend the AJ tag titles against the departing Chaparrita ASARI & Yuka Shina. However, Chikayo couldn’t wrestle due to her head injury, so the belts were forfeited. This would have been a good to very good match. Without this match, the card really went down hill a lot, at least to me.

The rest of the results saw KAORU & Maiko Matsumoto, who Gaea sent as replacements for Sato & Nagashima, defeat Kumiko Maekawa & Momoe Nakanishi. I doubt this was any good. ASARI defeated Shiina. Nanae Takahashi pinned the departing Saya Endo with a German suplex. In the opener, Miho Wakizawa defeated Miyuki Fujii. The main events are going to be make or break from now on because AJW simply has no depth.

JWP 9/20 Tokyo Korakuen Hall

Tomoko Kuzumi & Kanako Motoya captured the vacant JWP Korakuen Hall tag titles on 9/20. Kuzumi & Yuki Miyazaki were the original champions, winning a 4-team tournament on 4/21/96 to capture the titles. However, the 18-year-old Miyazaki retired earlier this year, leaving the belts vacant.

Kuzumi & Motoya defeated Cuty Suzuki & Tomoko Miyaguchi in the first round when Kuzumi pinned rival Miyaguchi with a victory roll off the top at 14:47. Kuzumi & Motoya then faced the Oz Academy duo of Mayumi Ozaki & Rieko Amano, who defeated Dynamite Kansai & Sari Osumi earlier that night, in the finals. Kuzumi & Motoya used several impressive aerial manuevers and double teams on Amano. Ozaki did something that is somewhat common in Japan when a veteran is paired with a youngster, in that she purposely didn’t come in the ring to make saves. The basic logic is that the veteran can’t be saving the youngster all the time. The youngster has to step up and kick out on her own, and if she can’t, then they don’t deserve to win the match. Basically they book things this way to show the youngster is growing by showing good fighting spirit and kicking out. However, this was one of the many cases where the youngster can’t withstand the onslaught. Motoya pinned Amano after a somersault leg drop off the top at 17:15 to capture the vacant titles.

With JWP having such a small crew, Kuzumi, their best young wrestler, has been promoted to star status. This started on 8/17 when they had her lose the JWP jr. title to Miyaguchi, with the logic being that a star should be above the junior title. Kuzumi is now positioned in the 2nd tier with Cuty Suzuki, who she’s beaten in singles earlier in the year, behind Fukuoka, Ozaki, Kansai, & Devil. I imagine Kuzumi’s singles loss to Ozaki on 9/16 in Sapporo was a really good match. Basically the future of the promotion rest in the hands of Kuzumi, Amano, Miyaguchi, and Motoya, all of whom have showed they are capable of taking over when the time comes, if not sooner.

Hikari Fukuoka defended her JWP open weight singles title, pinning Command Bolshoi after her moonsault footstomp at 15:15. This was a rare title shot for Bolshoi, earned by defeating Cuty Suzuki in the finals of the Body Heat tournament on 8/29. For some reason Bolshoi took her mask off midway through the match. This was the 2nd time that Bolshoi’s face was exposed, as Ozaki ripped her mask earlier last year, but she had never just taken her mask off before. Maybe they were trying to get her over as being a serious challenger? This was said to be better than you'd expect and the best match on a very good show.

All Japan Dream Match for Fan Appreciation Night

All Japan sold out Korakuen Hall on 9/15 for fan appreciation night. The main event was a 6-man with the top 6 heavyweights in the promotion. To make things even more special, they reunited Mitsuhara Misawa with rival Toshiaki Kawada and had Kenta Kobashi team with rival Akira Taue. This was the first time those pairs were together in quite some time. Misawa, Kawada, & Hiroshi Hase went to a 60:00 draw with Kobashi & Taue & Jun Akiyama. This was supposed to be as great as you would expect it to be, though I actually heard one report that said it was boring (I really doubt this was the case). I am dying to see this match, as it’s probably one of the best of the year, but there’s one problem. Fan appreciation night doesn’t air on tv and it’s not always released on commercial tape, so it’s possible that none of us will ever get to see it. I’m guessing that, since they went the full 60 minutes, AJ is planning on making more money off this than just the approximately $80,000 gate they get for a Korakuen sellout. This was Hase’s last match with AJ until January as he’s returning to his political duties with the Diet. I guess Hase returning to the Diet is a good excuse as to why they had to run Hase vs. Kobashi when they did, but the fact that they couldn’t even sellout Sapporo Nakajima Sports Center with that match as the semifinal shows that from a financial standpoint, it really wasn’t the right time to run that matchup.

Lucha Libre

EMLL ran their Anniversary show on 9/19 at Arena Mexico. The main event was El Hijo Del Santo vs. Negro Casas in a mask vs. hair match. Obviously, Casas was the one who did the job in that one. The show should air on Galavision next weekend.

Mosco de la Merced, Venum, Histeria, Super Muneco, Fishman, and Oro Jr. (aka Super Nova) all jumped to Promo Azteca. This is a big blow to AAA because Mosco,Venum, & Histeria were three of their best workers and they are still very young. Oro Jr. was no slouch either. Those guys were one of the only things that was keeping the tv show interesting throughout the post-Konnan era. Muneco is not good and I’ve always found him to be annoying. Fishman hasn’t meant anything in ages, so he’s just a waste of time and money.

I’ll give you three guesses what Antonio Pena is going to do to replace the wrestlers who left. Yep, you got it, he’s going to create a new Histeria, a new Mosco, and he has already created a new Psicosis. Leon Negro, a Tijuana wrestler who doesn’t have a lot of talent, but also doesn’t have a lot of regard for his body was introduced as the new Psicosis on AAA’s 9/14 Rio Nilo Coliseum show that somehow drew a turnaway 18,500 sellout in Guadalajara. Maybe the fact that AAA was really good the last time they ran that building, which was nearly two years ago, had something to do with it. The only way to tell is to see if the crowd holds up the next time they are there. In any case, the show was said to be the best show AAA could put on right now, but it was clear they are in bad shape.

TV Azteca and Konnan have been trying to get the Promo Azteca tv shows into the U.S. market. One station they have been negotiating with is the Spanish channel Telemundo. An announcement about whether they were able to get on Telemundo should be made within the next two weeks. I’m really hoping the deal goes through because I actually get this station. I remember talk of AAA getting on Telemundo a year or two ago and that unfortunately never went anywhere.

El Samurai vs. Koji Kanemoto

TV joined the action about 8:30 minutes in with Kanemoto roughing Samurai up with heel tactics, particularly focusing on El’s left knee. After rolling to the floor and selling his knee, an angry Samurai got revenge on Kanemoto by tying him up in the ropes and doing two sliding dropkicks to the face. However, on the 2nd sliding dropkick Kanemoto held El’s leg and turned it into an ankle lock. The crowd was popping for the spots throughout, which is a sign that they recognized how good this match was since, unlike other NJ wrestlers like Choshu, these guys don’t get pops because they are still breathing. The work was stiff, particularly the kicks of Kanemoto. Samurai directed his kicks at Kanemoto’s left eye. A characteristic of this match was that both men sold the moves well as far as their mannerisms during the submissions and after taking the moves, but there was no carry over selling. After Samurai broke an ankle submission, Kanemoto tried his moonsault, but Samurai avoided it and delivered an elbow followed by a decapitating lariat that Koji took a flip bump on. El suplexed Kanemoto to the floor then hit a tope suicida. When they returned to the ring, Kanemoto immediately came back with his overhead belly-to-belly suplex. This wasn’t as bad as other occasions when Kanemoto has used this ridiculous quick comeback spot because a tope isn’t a killer move. However, the fact that Kanemoto is still using this spot leads me to believe that he would have done the same thing had El used his reverse brainbuster outside the ring. Kanemoto immediately went back to the leg, using a knee cross scissors and a figure 4, but El got rope breaks. Kanemoto tied Samurai in the ropes and started sweeping his leg. The ref tried to break it, but dickish Kanemoto just pushed him aside and continued the assault. Kanemoto charged, but Samurai put him down with an elbow and both sold the spot. Samurai tried his Samurai bomb (Thunder Fire powerbomb), but Kanemoto slipped out, picked Samurai’s leg, and went back to the leg with announcer Tsuji putting the submission hold over like it was surely the finish. Kanemoto missed his rolling senton off the 2nd and El went back on offense, with the highlight being El getting a 2 3/4 count after his diving headbutt. Kanemoto eventually came back, suddenly finding it in him to throw a flurry of slaps then a rolling savate. Like Liger did to Samurai in the 1992 final, Kanemoto ripped El’s mask most of the way off, leaving his face exposed for the rest of the match. Samurai was the heel in the 1992 final, so El had the same thing done to him even though he was playing the opposite role. Kanemoto delivered a reverse Frankensteiner off the top, MOVE OF THE YEAR! Samurai was shaken up legit, as one would figure from taking that kind of bump directly on his head (I don’t think that was how he was supposed to land). Kanemoto never went for the cover, instead he stood around while the ref checked El then bought time for El by stomping him once in a while until Samurai recovered. First of all, this spot should have been saved for Kanemoto to win a major match with, prefferably when he wins the J Crown. Even if it wasn’t held off that long, this lethal spot certainly should have been the finish of whatever match it was debuted in. Instead, Kanemoto didn’t even go for the cover. Maybe he didn’t go for the cover because Samurai was hurting, but it looked totally ridiculous to see Kanemoto, deep into one of the biggest matches of his career, hit such a deadly move then follow it up with stomps. 40 seconds after the reverse Frankensteiner off the top, Kanemoto set Samurai up for his moonsault, but when he attempted the move, Samurai got his knees up. Figuring the stomps were just impromptu while Samurai was hurting, if the moonsault was supposed to be next, that means that Samurai can take a reverse Frankensteiner off the top, then immediately counter Kanemoto’s moonsault and go back on offense. What kind of ridiculousness is this? Even worse is that Samurai was totally fired up during his comeback. He wasn’t selling his previous injuries one bit, as if he was the Ultimate Warrior minus the annoying rope shaking routine. Samurai delived two Samurai bombs then applied the jujigatame, but Kanemoto got a rope break. This whole sequence held as much water as the worst incarnation of ECW crap. Ok, maybe it wasn’t that bad, but there’s no question that great workers in their 30's should know better than this. It was apparent by now that Kanemoto was calling the match and in doing so, his weaknesses in selling and timing were being magnified. Samurai’s best asset is that he is the perfect complement, however, in some cases that can work against him. El is the senior wrestler here, but he did Kanemoto’s match. In working Kanemoto’s match, he did his job by going with the flow that Kanemoto set, but one of the things that Kanemoto led him to was quick comebacks. If it were Liger calling the singles match, you can guarantee that Samurai or Kanemoto wouldn’t be doing as many quick comebacks because the match Liger would be dictating would be less apt to lead there. Herein lies what seperates Liger from the rest of the NJ juniors. Liger no longer has the most physical ability in that division, but he is miles ahead of the others in the mental aspects, thus his knowledge and ability to implent it allows him to hold his spot as the best junior in NJ and in the world for that matter. Samurai went to the top, but Kanemoto cut him off with a mere slap, which somehow bought him enough time to execute a Super turning powerslam. Kanemoto got great flight out of his moonsault, as Samurai was lying on the legendary B.V.D. logo. Kanemoto opted to forgo the cover in favor of executing his Tiger suplex finisher, but even then he could only get a near fall. Kanemoto missed his rolling senton. Samurai followed with a great finishing sequence of a Super reverse DDT (If it isn’t a new spot it’s at least new to me), a reverse brainbuster where Kanemoto landed face first, and his reverse brainbuster for the win. I personally thought it would have made sense to revcrse the sequence, finishing off with the new move, since it’s a better version of his regular finisher. In any case, the finish got a big pop. It’s ironic that the submissions, which traditionally aren’t key to junior matches, were sold and put over excellently, while the high spots, which have been the staple in junior action for years, were not sold that well, thus wound up carrying less weight. This was the first time Samurai, who lost to Liger in the 1992 final and Benoit in the 1993 final, won the Super Jr. tournament. Definitely a great match and a very exciting match, but there’s no way this match deserves *****. The obvious flaw was the quick comebacks, which took away the importance of the many great moves they displayed. It was nice that they did all those high spots and the execution of them was just about perfect, but they got no mileage from the numerous awesome spots. What makes a move important and effective is not how good it looks, but how it’s treated. Almost any move can be important, you just have to sell it as such and educate your audience to it. The work was excellent, the execution was crisp, it was considerably stiff for a junior match, the transition between holds was sleek and fluid, and the high spots ranged from great to unbelievable. From that standpoint, the match was near perfect, however, there’s more to a match than that. This match really didn’t hold a candle to Liger vs. Samurai in the 1992 Super Junior final. That match was sheer brilliance. It was just clicking the whole time and it was great in every aspect. There Liger incorporated the All Japan style to the junior style, as it had what this match was missing, the timing and selling that made the great moves that they were doing important. The difference between the two finals can be summed up by saying that Liger vs. Samurai was a brilliant match, while Kanemoto vs. Samurai was just an awesome spectical. The best junior match of 1997 is still Liger vs. Otani from 2/9. The storyline, psychology, and timing of that match were much stronger than what we saw here. Liger vs. Otani had quick comebacks as well, but the storyline they were doing, with the young punk pushing the champion to the limit before jobbing, necessitates some quick comebacks. Aside from the very stupid quick comeback after the out of the ring spot, the couple other quick comebacks added to the match because they enhanced the storyline. Whereas the quick comebacks didn’t enhance the storyline of Samurai vs. Kanemoto at all and it wasn’t that they were necessary because they were doing a lightning fast-paced match. Kanemoto is a super worker, but he is lacking in the mental aspects. He is a very good heel, except he still looks like a 22-year-old babyface who’s trying to pop the crowd by making a hot comeback. I’m a huge fan of Kanemoto and I’ve supported him for a long time, but I honestly think he’s starting to get a big overrated. Again, it was a great match that was damn enjoyable, but please look past the highspots and examine the full scope of what you are seeing before you attach ***** to any match. 23:51 (15:21 aired). ****1/2

Pancrase Special on Gaora 6/15/97 taped 5/24 Kobe

Takafumi Ito vs. Kim Jong Wan. Jobber Wan looks to kick too much since his kicks are slow and have no snap on them. Once it went to the mat Kim was basically clueless. Kim was quickly fooled into leaving his arm open, thus Ito applied the jujigatame for the win. Jobber Wan was out of his league and Ito isn’t even that good. :55

Keiichiro Yamamiya vs. Kiuma Kunioku. This was a good evenly contested matchup of two of Pancrase’s best youngsters. Both men were very cautious. Yamamiya looked to get a leg submission, but couldn’t get anywhere. Kunioku got a heel hold on, but didn’t have the leverage to make it effective. A stalemate that wound up being a 10:00 draw.

Semmy Schilt vs. Takaku Fuke. Schilt totally dominated the standup portion due to his huge size difference. It was kind of amazing to see how easily Schilt could reach around Fuke’s body. Schilt used a rear choke, which forced Fuke to take a rope escape. Schilt still seems kind of weak in submissions, but he is in the dominant position and has leverage so often that he is able to get a lot of basic submission moves on. Schilt, who was on top, utilized his forearm to choke Fuke, which both bloodied Fuke’s nose and caused Fuke to rope escape. Fuke tried a spinning leg sweep, but it was totally unsuccessful and lead to Schilt getting the forearm choke on again and Fuke taking his 3rd rope escape. Eventually Schilt got a rear choke on and Fuke tapped out. Very one-sided bout. Fuke is extremely unimpressive these days, but I think this was more a case of him being overmatched. Schilt wasn’t too impressive here, as although he really had his way, it took him longer than it should have to put Fuke away. 8:59

Jason Delucia vs. Yoshiki Takahashi. This was almost entirely contested on the mat. Takahashi was on top most of the time, but he got little accomplished. The finish was beautiful as Delucia baited Takahashi, who was on top but at a distance, into going for another forearm choke. When Takahashi moved forward to do so, Delucia lifted Takahashi’s body up with his legs so he could use one of his arms to hook Takahashi’s leg and the other to hook Takahashi’s arm. In one fail swoop, Delucia had Takahashi’s appendages hooked, took him over to his back, and had the jujigatame on. Takahashi was immediately forced Takahashi to tap. 5:13

Yuki Kondo vs. Gary Myers. Kondo’s King of Pancrase was not on the line here. Myers in no way resembles what a shooter is "supposed to" look like. He’s a short stubby guy with a pot belly and a receding hair line. Kondo almost immediately put Myers down with a high kick. Myers utilized some weird tactics, like pinning Kondo in the corner until the ref called for a restart. Myers clearly couldn’t stand toe-to-toe with Kondo, as his only defense for Kondo’s strikes was that he backed up as quick as he could every time Kondo began throwing a strike. At one point, Myers threw a lousy leg sweep and was so concerned with backing up in case Kondo fired back that he lost his balance and fell on his butt. The match was almost all standup, but Myers eventually saw that was working and made a feeble attempt at a takedown which resulted in Kondo being on top and in control. Myers couldn’t do anything on his feet and Kondo is much better on the mat, so Myers was very much overmatched. The finish came when Myers gave Kondo a big opening by concentrating too much on defending his upper body, thus Kondo spun into what almost looked like a spinning toe hold. Myers tapped before Kondo even had the leg lock fully locked in. A walk-over victory for the King. 5:35

Minoru Suzuki vs. Joel Sutton. Suzuki was making his return from injury. Sutton, a UFC veteran, had no body tone at all. He was just there to be meat and it went as Pancrase had hoped. Suzuki was practically licking his chops the second they hit the mat. He easily got in the desired position then straightened Sutton’s arm and that was that. Suzuki, who has great charisma, really played to the crowd after his win. :48

Pancrase Special on Gaora 7/1/97 taped 6/18 Tokyo Korakuen Hall

Satoshi Hasegawa vs. Paul Lezenby. Hasegawa used a nice heel hold, but then Lezenby applied an ankle lock. Hasegawa’s submission hold was apparently the more effective of the two as Lezenby was forced to use a rope escape. Hasegawa clearly wanted this bout to be contested on the mat. He was able to make that happen by easily taking Lezenby down. Hasegawa got a heel hold on which he could have won with, but Lezenby was so close to the rope that Hasegawa had to settle for making him use a rope escape. The bout went the 10:00 time limit. About 4:20 aired and it was pretty uneventful. Hasegawa was declared the winner because he didn’t lose any points while Lezenby lost two from the rope escapes.

Osami Shibuya vs. David Moore. This was Moore’s Pancrase debut. Shibuya was in better shape here than I can ever remember him being in. Moore was trying to get the jujigatame on, but Shibuya grabbed the ropes which seemed like a questionable decision to me. Shibuya had Moore’s ankle and tried to slide him to the center of the ring, but Moore grabbed the ropes before they were out of reach. I felt this was also a questionable decision as Moore didn’t look like he was in that bad a spot. Shibuya got an incredibly painful looking ankle lock on Moore. However, Moore continually moved to lessen the pressure until he turned enough that the hold was no longer effective and Shibuya simply released it. Very nice work by Moore. Shibuya had a straight arm bar practically cinched, but Moore powered out which was quite impressive. With Shibuya high up on Moore, Moore made the mistake of leaving his leg unprotected, so Shibuya applied an ankle lock for the win. Good bout. Moore was better than I figured he would be, though he seemed a long way from being anything at this level. 5:45

Takafumi Ito vs. Jason Godsey. Godsey made his Pancrase debut here. Godsey showed strong wrestling skills, but weak submission skills. Godsey tried the front chancelry twice, but Ito stopped it. Godsey got carded for kicking Ito when he was down. Godsey was able to take Ito down and control him almost at will, but Ito has good defense and quickness, so Godsey couldn’t put him in much danger. Ito tried to take Godsey over into a leg lock, but the combination of Godsey’s weight advantage and his base were too much. Godsey got a yellow card for elbowing Ito in the back. Godsey contested he was using his upper arm, but I couldn’t tell if that was the case since the camera angle was bad. Godsey gave Ito an opening by trying to change his positioning and Ito capitilized on it by getting behind the kneeling Godsey. Godsey made a second mistake, which was failing to tuck his head with Ito behind him. The result was Ito applying a choke sleeper for the win. Godsey was disgusted with himself, and rightfully so because he totally controlled the match, but couldn’t put Ito away. Godsey was in a way similar to Severn when he first was in UFC, in that you could tell this guy had the tools to be really good if he could just develop some finishers. Very exciting and improbable finish. 11:55

Ryushi Yanagisawa vs. Les Johnston. Johnston made his Pancrase debut here. The first 8 minutes of this match was practically putting me to sleep as there was basically nothing going on. After a restart due to a lull in the "action," Yanagisawa finally got his chance to kick. Johnston tried to backpedal to avoid Yanagisawa’s high kick, but he just made it worse for himself as the kick would up catching him flush in the nose and cheek for a knockdown. Johnston shot as soon as he got up because he quickly knew he didn’t stand a chance on his feet with Yanagisawa, who’s fortee is kicking. Shooting was also unsuccessful as he took a knee and a palm strike before Yanagisawa kneeled over him. Johnston had Yanagisawa’s leg, but the much taller Yanagisawa simply reached over Johnston’s body and pulled his leg up (called a leg split) for the win. Exciting finish, but the rest was boring. 8:35

Kiuma Kunioku vs. Jason Delucia. Everyone knew Delucia would have a big advantage when it came to striking and this match did everything to prove everyone right. Kunioku was faster than Delucia and had the quickness to avoid many of Delucia’s palm blows, but you can’t dodge them all. Delucia was effective with left hand palm blows here, as he hit Kiuma around his right eye with them 3 times in the first 1:15. This along with some other shots to the eye later on, lead to Kunioku’s right eye being basically swollen shut by the halfway point in the match. The swelling was really terrible to the point where he looked like he had a giant blister that was just about to pop. Kunioku was willing to take a few shots in order to take Delucia down, but he wasn’t able to take Delucia down nearly enough times. The bout was pretty much evenly contested when it was on the mat, with Delucia looking better here than I expected him too. Delucia said after the bout that one of the things that helped him was that, unlike his last meeting with Kunioku, he threw strikes from the mat. Kunioku couldn’t take Delucia down enough, so he wound up fighting Delucia’s fight. Even with his eye shut, Kiuma was able to dodge most of Delucia’s strikes. However, he couldn’t do any damage to Delucia while they were standing up so every blow that landed, even though most didn’t do that much damage, was a bonus for Jason. Both men are good defensively on the mat and don’t make mistakes, so it was hard for either to finish the other off. It looked like Kiuma might win when he pushed way out of a headlock and got a rear choke on, but Delucia stopped Kunioku from getting his arm under Jason’s neck. Delucia was able to squirm close enough to the rope that the ref broke it, which was very good on Jason’s part because 16 minutes into a 20 minute time limit bout, you have to consider that 1 point might be the difference in the outcome. After some strikes, Jason tried for a takedown near the ropes and Kiuma went through the ropes and almost to the floor. Before the bout was restarted, the ref checked Kiuma out. Kiuma now had a cut around his "good eye." With both eyes now being a problem, the doctor ruled that Kunioku couldn’t continue. Considering Kunioku fought Jason’s match and he couldn’t see out of one eye for half the bout, he gave a good showing. Kunioku definitely showed good fighting spirit by continuing with the badly swollen eye. I was quite surprised when I originally got the result that Kunioku had won because the doctor stopped the bout. The actual result, with Jason winning via doctor stoppage makes much more sense. Definitely a good match. Kunioku will improve more and he’ll learn from this bout just as Delucia learned from their earlier bout. I’d like to see them have a rematch around the end of this year. 18:51

Minoru Suzuki vs. Jagjit Singh. Not much to say here. Suzuki faced an incredibly weak opponent who was making his Pancrase debut and he KO’d him in a matter of seconds. The KO looked very questionable to me. Singh, an Indian nation champion in wrestling 5 different times, decided to shoot at the same time Suzuki tried to throw a high kick. The result was Suzuki pretty much kneed him in the side of the head and Singh went down, though the strike didn’t appear to have much impact. :21

All Japan The Champion Carnival League Series 1997 Commercial Tape

The tape began with highlights of the Carny bouts that aired on tv. If you watched the tv shows, then this was a waste of time, but if not it was a fair job at getting you up to speed. Then it was onto the good stuff, the Carny final from 4/19/97 Tokyo Budokan Hall.

Mitsuharu Misawa vs. Kenta Kobashi in the first part of the triangular Champion Carnival final. The match had an interesting start with some catch as catch can style wrestling before Kobashi took control after 2 rolling (discus) chops to the neck. Misawa’s neck was injured by taking a Jun Akiyama exploder during the league portion of the Carnival, so they turned the neck injury into a convenient bit of psychology that would continue to be played off on this big night. Kobashi then tried for his powerbomb, but Misawa countered it with his corbata (twisting Frankensteiner). They teased Kobashi’s lariat and released Tiger suplex ’85 before Misawa took full control by countering Kobashi’s jumping tackle with his elbow and hitting a twisting plancha. Misawa was relying heavily on his trusty elbow and he also used two facelocks early, but the fans weren’t buying his finishers because they knew the ending wasn’t going to come that soon. After Misawa missed a reverse diving elbow off the 2nd, Kobashi came back hitting DDT’s then a German suplex for a near fall, which got a decent reaction from the crowd. Kobashi used Misawa’s facelock on him, but Misawa slid over to the ropes. Misawa tried to comeback, but Kobashi caught his spinning high kick and Dangerous backdropped him for a near fall. Both men were making an effort to get crowd heat early, maybe because of the short Kawada vs. Misawa that was to follow, but in most cases they weren’t successful. The crowd got into it just before the 13 minute mark when Kobashi cut Misawa off in the corner before he could do a flying move and tried to back suplex him off the 2nd. However, Misawa landed on his feet, elbowed Kobashi and pretty much completely missed a spin kick, which was the worst looking spot of the match. With Misawa getting up from his knees, Kenta tried his lariat, but Misawa avoided it by remaining on his knees. Misawa ducked a lariat and delivered a released German suplex followed by an elbow suicida, which Kobashi sold like a champ. Misawa went to the air for a series of near falls, with unsuccessful Tiger Driver attempts in the middle an end of the sequence. Kobashi made his comeback after matadoring Misawa’s diving elbow. After both men sold due to the sum of the blows, Kobashi gave Misawa a Dangerous released German suplex. Though Misawa has proven time and time again to be the master of selling his previous injuries, Kenta’s selling of previous injuries here deserves credit as well. Kenta ducked Misawa’s elbow and went into a Dangerous released Tiger Suplex ’85 for a near fall. Misawa landed on his feet for a brainbuster then ducked Kobashi’s lariat, but Kobashi used his other arm and enzui lariated Misawa. It was clear that Kenta was once again sacrificing his move set in favor of the simple psychology of building the match around his lariat finisher. Kobashi used powerbombs in rapid succession then went to the jackknife for a hot near fall. Misawa did some more great selling, bobbing his head and spinning it around in effort to get his neck back in place. Misawa stopped Kobashi’s lariat twice, elbowing him in the lariat arm on the 2nd attempt and both sold the spot. Misawa stopped Kobashi’s Dragon suplex and enzui rolling elbowed him, but like Kobashi earlier, he was "too hurt" to cover. Misawa cheated by released Tiger suplexing Kobashi twice in a row even though Kenta had made it to the ropes. The crowd was into the match big time now and Misawa’s Tiger Driver for a near fall only furthered their enthusiasm. There was a big KO-BA-SHI chant. Kobashi avoided the Tiger Driver by back body dropping Misawa over the top rope, but Misawa landed on the apron and elbowed Kenta, with Kenta crashing to the mat like a happless victim of The Raging Bull. Misawa tried his diving neckbreaker drop, but Kobashi neckbreaker dropped Misawa as well. Misawa turned over and drapped his arm over Kobashi for a near fall. Kobashi blocked the Tiger Driver, but Misawa hit a rolling guillotine leg drop and brought the crowd to their feet with his Tiger Driver. Everyone saw this as the finish of the match, but Kenta just managed to kick out. Misawa charged at Kenta, attempting to finish Kobashi off the same way he did on 1/20/97 to win the Triple Crown, but this time it was Kenta who hit his move, the lariat, as a counter to the charge. Kobashi sold his lariat arm like it was broke, making an unsuccessful attempt at crawling over to pin Misawa. After a stalemate, Kobashi used a series of blows to Misawa’s back then was able to get him up and jackknife him. However, Kobashi didn’t have the strength to plant Misawa into the mat, instead he fell forward while executing the move and by the time he made it over for the pin it was too late. Misawa was still able to block the Orange bomb, but after Kobashi hit two rolling chops, Misawa succumbed to the move, but kicked out at 2 9/10. With more than 29 minutes gone, Kobashi exploited Misawa’s weakened neck with a DDT. Kobashi went to the corner so that once Misawa got up, he’d put and end to this with his running lariat. With Misawa up, Kobashi charged, but Misawa blocked the lariat! With time just about up, Kobashi crawled over in desperation and covered Misawa anyway, but he wasn’t going to beat Misawa in that fashion. Just after Misawa got his foot on the rope, the 30 minute time limit expired. As a stand alone piece, I guess this would be somewhat of a disappointment because it didn't come close to their 3/31/96 or 1/20/97 all-time classics. Considering both men had to continue on in the triangle match after this, you couldn't have asked for a heck of a lot more though. I mean, the pacing was a bit slow, but Kobashi had to work almost 22 min with Kawada after this 30 minute draw, so it had to be that way. If anything, this match turned out to be a bit too tolling because Kenta seemed winded at times during the final. In any case, this was as great in complete form as the 15 minutes that aired on tv led me to believe it would be. ****1/4

Mitsuharu Misawa vs. Toshiaki Kawada in the 2nd part of the triangular Carny final. The whole match aired on tv it was reviewed in Quebrada #23. This was really a waste. After all the great matches they have given us, the match Kawada finally gets his win in turns out to be the worst and least memorable of them all. It would have made more sense to have Misawa vs. Kawada be the last match and have Kawada win that. That way, the thing everyone would remember is that Kawada finally got over the hump against Misawa and in doing so, he won the Carny as well. What people remember about the '80 Olympics hockey is US beating USSR. That wasn't the final and wouldn't have been nearly as memorable if US then lost the final, but if you were booking it you would have made it the final because winning the gold paled in comparison to beating the "enemy". In any case, I pretty much hated this match. The execution and work were fine, but it was basically a glorified squash. 6:09. **3/4

Toshiaki Kawada vs. Kenta Kobashi in the 3rd part of the triangular Carny final. These matches were basically started one after the other, so there was little time for the wrestler that was continuing on to recuperate. Since Kobashi had worked such a long first match, they used the logical storyline that they were tired and injured (not that there wasn’t some truth to this). This whole match also aired on tv and was reviewed in Quebrada # 25. A notable difference about the commercial version was that the camera picked up Kobashi walking to the ring before he came out through the curtain. Kobashi was selling his lariat arm, however, he stopped selling it when he went through the curtain so Kawada and the fans wouldn’t know "how bad of shape it was in." I thought this was great because the key to the psychology of the match was Kawada doing an all out attack on Kobashi’s lariat arm, but Kobashi still trying to use the injured arm to score the big win. This was the best match of the triangular final, with the psychology being really strong. A great match, particularly since both men had just finished working singles matches with Misawa. 21:27. ****1/2

I think these three matches showed that the gap between Misawa, Kobashi, & Kawada is extremely small. Kobashi wrestled in the two best matches, but I thought he was the worse of the two workers in both of his matches. However, with the Misawa vs. Kawada match taken into consideration, you could easily say that Kobashi was the best since he had ****+ matches with both opponents while they had a quite mediocre match on their own.

I’d say that Misawa is clearly better than Kobashi this year. The main thing Kobashi had on Misawa was his move set, but Kobashi hasn’t delved deep into it this year and Misawa’s move set has clearly been vaster. Kobashi’s smaller move set has increased the psychology of his matches, so it hasn’t been such a bad thing (*the psychology was likely more due to his opponents*) I mean, Kawada traded his move set for psychology and look where he is today. The problem for Kobashi is that Misawa and Kawada have clear roles while Kobashi is still struggling to assume his new role. No one in the world can touch Misawa for selling and no one in the world can touch Kawada for psychology. Kobashi doesn’t have one thing that he’s the best at right now, but you could make that comment about almost every wrestler. Kobashi is a fantastic worker and his workrate is better than just about any heavyweight in the history of the sport. I think Misawa has been a better worker this year though. I’d also say that Akiyama has been a better worker this year because his youth and his positioning allows him to be the most consistent worker in the promotion.

At this point, I’d say Misawa is the best of the three and if I was voting for wrestler of the year right now, I would vote for Misawa. Kobashi or Kawada is really too close to call right now. Kobashi has had more really good matches, and he’s done so with more different opponents, but he also had more opportunities to do so. Kobashi has more diversity, but you can’t top Kawada in Kawada’s style.

The next segment of the tape focused on the wrestlers from other promotions that AJ brought in. In general, bringing in the other leagues workers has provided solid undercard matches, but unlike NJ, AJ hasn’t really made any money from the use of outsiders. They showed highlights of the quite mediocre Naoki Sano (Kingdom) & Masa Fuchi vs. Johnny Smith & Tornado match from 3/30/97. I can’t believe they included Sano’s blown (due to Tornado’s inability to take the bump) huracanrana.

Hayabusa (FMW) & Tornado vs. Maunakea Mossman & Kentaro Shiga from 4/2/97. This was also shown in highlight form. Hayabusa & Shiga were really good together, doing all kinds of great high spots for hot near falls. It looked like Hayabusa had Shiga pinned with his Falcon Arrow, but Mossman just made the save. Hayabusa then used his firebird splash (Scorpio splash) to pin Shiga at 16:46.

Hayabusa & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Yoshinari Ogawa & Kentaro Shiga from 4/19/97. It’s kind of funny to see Kanemaru work with Shiga because a while back it seemed almost unimaginable that there would ever be anyone in AJ that was actually smaller than Shiga. Who cares about size though, these two are real good and they have great chemistry together. They made this match and those two, along with Mossman, have consistently provided the best undercard matches in AJ this year. I think Ogawa and Kikuchi have declined a lot, but Shiga, Kanemaru, and Mossman have improved a lot so the veteran juniors are still looking pretty good and adding something to the tag matches. They played up a grudge between Shiga and Hayabusa, with Shiga surprisingly running to the opposition’s corner and elbowing Hayabusa, who wasn’t the legal man, off the apron. A little after this, Shiga ducked a palm strike and slapped Hayabusa in the face. Shiga was the most over of the four, but the crowd was popping for everyone’s high spots and Hayabusa was definitely over. Kanemaru did a nice sequence with Shiga where he did a rolling (handspring) elbow followed by a springboard reverse facecrusher off the 2nd. Kanemaru whipped Ogawa into the corner, but missed a high kick and got his leg stuck over the top rope. Shiga immediately capitalized by dropkicking Kanemaru in the knee and "injuring it." Ogawa and Shiga then launched a vicious all out attack on Kanemaru’s knee, which made for a good single match storyline and ensured that this wasn’t just going to be a high spot fest. Ogawa teased Hayabusa by holding out Kanemaru’s arm, keeping it just out of Hayabusa’s reach so they couldn’t tag. Hayabusa saved his partner from various leg submissions. When Shiga whipped Kanemaru into the corner, Kanemaru finally came back by backflipping out then hitting a flying headscissors and a dropkick. The key thing was that Kanemaru, who’s only 20-years-old, knew to sell his knee injury when he landed on the backflip. Kanemaru made a hot tag to Hayabusa, who entered the ring by swandive spinkicking Shiga. Hayabusa took Ogawa out with a Frankensteiner then got a near fall on Shiga with a wheel kick. Hayabusa then tried the Machine windmill suplex (bridging hammerlock suplex) on Shiga, but Ogawa cut him off. Ogawa & Shiga double teamed Hayabusa, with Ogawa setting up Hayabusa then Shiga getting a near fall with his swandive splash. Shiga did his swinging DDT off the 2nd then climbed the ropes and did another swinging DDT to Hayabusa, but Kanemaru made the save. Kanemaru, who was still remembering to limp and hobble around, hit a hell of a moonsault block for a near fall on Shiga. Ogawa came in and used his knee breaker then his backdrop on Kanemaru, but Hayabusa made the save. Hayabusa lifted Shiga up in fireman’s carry position and Kanemaru jumped off the top onto Shiga’s back then off Shiga’s back onto Ogawa with a splash for a near fall. Hayabusa then deposited Shiga over the top rope and proceeded to pescado him. Ogawa went for yet another knee breaker, but Kanemaru countered it by landing on his feet. Ogawa immediately took Kanemaru’s bad knee out with a kick then hit his bridging backdrop for the win. Good work and high spots. Very good storyline and psychology. Kanemaru and Shiga were very impressive. You might laugh, but Hayabusa is actually a pretty strong candidate for most improved. Pretty much all Hayabusa’s matches this year have been good, while last year they were mainly average to poor. 13:53. ***1/4

Jd’ Special on Gaora 6/2/97 taped 4/20 Tokyo Korakuen Hall

This was the biggest show in the history of Jd’, a 2,205 sellout of Korakuen Hall. I think Gaora should air the Jd’ from the hall more often. This was not a great show or even a good show by normal standards, but by Jd’ standards it was great and it’s the best hour of Jd’ I’ve seen. Faint praise, but at least there were two good matches and some semblance of workrate was finally shown.

Megumi Yabushita vs. Sumie Sakai. It’s a scary thought sitting down to watch a Jd’ rookies match. You wonder if this is going to like watching paint dry, like sitting though a pointless Arthur Penn movie instead of an expertly scripted Eric Rohmer one. It turned out to be more like watching two Naoya Ogawa’s, except this was actually enjoyable. It’s fitting these two women were debuting against each other since both 25-year-olds have been together on the Japanese national judo team for quite some time. Yabushita seems to have been the better of the two in judo, as she was world champion in her weight class in 1995, however, Sakai is a better of the two in this sport. The match was built around their strengths, as it was predominantly worked around judo spots. Both women worked for the jujigatame. Sakai tried a snapmare, but Yabushita turned it into a backslide. Sakai got a near fall with a "revenge" backslide for Yabushita’s snapmare. Sakai delivered a gyaku ipponzeoi (judo arm takedown) then tried for another, but Yabushita landed on her feet and slowly went into a choke sleeper. Yabushita proved she had made the transition to puroresu, switching the bout to pro style, using basic rookie offense for a near fall. After taking one snapmare, Sakai once again turned Yabushita’s snapmare into a backslide, but the spot once again proved unsuccessful as a finisher. The match was going good, but fell apart at the end as Yabushita showed her greeness when Sakai Irish whipped her and she didn’t know what to do, so she just trotted into the rope. Luckily the equally inexperienced Sakai saved some embarrassment by hitting a running dropkick. Unfortunately, they went to another Irish whip spot, which resulted in a standstill until Yabushita delivered a judo takedown for the win. Considering they were green as hell this was a good match, as despite their limited move sets, they were able to incorporate psychology into the match. Both women showed good potential. The main problem was that Yabushita’s transition between holds was pretty shaky at times, but that’s a problem that could easily be corrected with a bit more seasoning. As with all rookie matches it was very basic, but it was clearly a match that could easily be built upon. These two, but particularly Sakai, showed good potential. It’s too bad they are so old for debuting wrestlers. 6:24. *3/4

Miyuki Sogabe vs. Miho Wakizawa (AJW). Another rookies match, which unfortunately was one of the ones you fear watching. Pretty much a nothing match with some basic moves back and forth. The execution was far from crisp and the match had no storyline or psychology. The finish was one of the stupidest I’ve ever seen as, Wakizawa slammed Sogabe and covered. Sogabe escaped the pin 6 times, mainly by bridging out, but never knocked Wakizawa off her, so Wakizawa just kept covering Sogabe until she was pinned. Real boring and bad with neither showing anything. 12:07. 1/4*

The Goddess Chikako Shiratori & Yuko Kosugi & Yuki Lee vs. La Infernal & Ryura & Neftaly. They joined the match at the 15 minute mark and the match only lasted 17:22. Why bother? Kosugi & Lee held Ryura in the air and The Goddess came off the top with a sky high missile kick. The luchadores took control with the big spot being Infernal hitting a fat diving senton of Kosugi, but Kosugi’s partners made the save. Ryura then hit a skinnier diving senton on Kosugi and, with Neftaly & Infernal holing off her partners, Kosugi couldn’t kick out. Seemed quite bad as the Mexicans looked awful and Yuki, who’s presence wasn’t really felt on this version, is bad as well. 17:22. NR

Cooga vs. The Bloody. Cooga went on offense initially, but Ryura quickly interfered by tripping up Cooga. With Ryura’s help, Bloody tried to play heel, brawling all over the hall. Bloody used the slowest rolling German suplex known to man or woman, then went back her heel tactics as her and Ryura double suplexed Cooga on the floor. Cooga avoided Bloody’s tope, which would up hitting Ryura, and hit a plancha of her own. Cooga controlled the rest of the match, hitting a series of big moves before putting Bloody away with a bridging back suplex. No build to the finish whatsoever. Nothing particularly good or bad, just a run of the mill match. 15:45. *3/4

Jaguar Yokota vs. Esther Moreno. This match showed the brilliance of Jaguar, as the guided the over the hill spotblowing stiff Esther to her first good match in quite a while. Esther wasn’t even blowing spots here. Jaguar concentrated on submissions, but Esther turned the tide by escaping Jaguar’s hanging backbreaker with a sunset flip. The pace of the match picked up with both women getting near falls. The worst spot of the match came, as Esther sloppily whipped Jaguar into the ropes, so Jaguar springboarded to the 2nd. Esther was supposed to released German suplex Jaguar off the rope, but she was a little slow getting there so Jaguar just waited. For Esther standards, I’m nitpicking in even pointing this out. Esther got a near fall with a Scorpio splash. Esther tried to follow with her moonsault, but Jaguar stood up to avoid it, then Jaguar hit a moonsault block off the 2nd. Jaguar went for her underhook piledriver, but Esther back body dropped her. However, Jaguar never let go of Esther’s arms, so she bridged out and went into a Tiger driver for a near fall. Esther avoided a missile kick and went to the 2nd rope, but in the highlight of the match, Jaguar jumped to the 2nd and bodyscissor victory rolled Esther off the 2nd for a near fall. Jaguar went for her underhook piledriver again, but Esther turned it into a backslide. However, Jaguar rolled through the backslide then piledrove Esther for a near fall. Jaguar set up her backsuperplex with overhead flip, but Esther knocked Jaguar off then 2nd and set up her moonsault. Before Esther could jump, Jaguar got up and hit her then delivered the back superplex with overhead flip for the win. Creative match with some nice spots by both women and forth and uncharacteristically good work by Esther. Unfortunately, only 4:45 aired. 13:00. ***

Bison Kimura vs. Lioness Asuka for Asuka’s TWF title. This is about as big a match as Jd’ can present. Neither wrestler had been doing much of quality lately, but both flashed back to the high quality work of their AJW days. Lioness, although she’s the heel, offered a handshake before the match started, but Bison set the tone by stepping back and continuing her cold stare. This event foreshadowed the storyline as it showed that Lioness was willing to wrestle a clean match, but it would be the face, Bison, who wouldn’t show good sportsmanship. The two veterans concentrated on submission work during the 1st half, as the match was going to go long, building up to the high spots. In what proved to be a key to the psychology of the match, Lioness attempted her powerbomb, but Bison stopping it by making it to the ropes. The early portion was slow-paced, with the execution being both deliberate and crisp. Asuka tried for her powerbomb, but Bison landed on her feet and tried her famous chop, so Lioness ducked it and applied a rear choke. Lioness went for her powerbomb once again, but Bison shifted her weight and landed on top for a 2 count. It appeared that the pacing was about to pick up as Bison went to her blazing chop. However, Lioness ducked the blazing chop and the result of both women trying German suplexes was Lioness rolling Bison into a kneebar. Lioness tried her powerbomb, but Bison pulled out yet another counter, this time turning it into a sloppy huracanrana. Bison, who appeared frustrated after Asuka got out of her figure 4 by a rope break, took the action to the floor. Although Bison has always been a brawler it was odd that, in a match where Asuka didn’t feel like being Shark 2, Bison was the one who initiated the brawling by throwing chairs at the downed Lioness’ leg. Bison quickly took the action back to the ring, trying to finish Asuka with her diving headbutt, but the tide was turned as Asuka got her feet up. Asuka brawled outside the ring, acting as if she had "snapped," then delivered a killer piledriver on an unbreakable ringside table. Yuko Kosugi, who was almost "crying," and Esther Moreno layed over Bison’s head and chest, allowing Bison to blade. After 45 seconds of selling, the bloody Bison staggered to her feet, only to be met by an Asuka chair shot. After a series of her famous kicks, Lioness got near falls after two henkei powerbombs. Lioness signaled that she was about to finish Bison off, giving the "cut throat" sign, then finally hit her powerbomb. After working so long for the powerbomb, one would have thought that Lioness would immediately cover Bison, however, she gave meaning to the early submission work by forgoing the cover in favor of applying a choke sleeper. After not being able to put Bison out in 90 seconds, Lioness simply released the hold and, once again making the "cut throat" sign, tried to finish Bison with her towerhacker bomb (torture rack into a powerbomb). Unfortunately, Lioness couldn’t get Bison up the first time, so she redid the spot. It turned into a hot spot anyway as Bison rolled off Lioness shoulders, landing in a standing position on the ring apron, and hit her chop. Bison then tried for a diving chop, but Lioness kicked Bison’s arm in midair. After escaping a submission, Bison came back with a series of her blazing chops for a near fall. Bison delivered her moonsault finisher, coming within inches of the title before Lioness lifted her shoulder. Bison, who had worked for nodowa otoshi’s early on, went to a super nodowa otoshi. After being unsuccessful finishing with technical wrestling, Bison once again went to brawling, lying a table flat in the ring and piledriving Asuka on it twice for a near fall. Up to this point, this was probably the most intelligently worked woman’s match from 1997 that I’ve seen. The match was neither glamorous nor exciting (then again glamour is boring anyway), but for psychology, build, and execution it was damn good. Unfortunately, in Toyota vs. Kyoko 12/8/96 fashion, it was the table that held the match down. Bison tried to set up the table so she could place Lioness on it and moonsault her, but the table wouldn’t stand. Fans in the hall were laughing. After the table fell down the 2nd time, Kosugi and Yuki Lee came in the ring to help set it up. Finally Bison attempted the moonsault with Lioness on the table, but thankfully for the credibility of the match, Lioness moved and Bison went through the table. Lioness then "snapped" again, bringing another table into the ring and placing it on Bison’s stomach, then doing two diving footstomps onto the table for a 2 3/4 count. After getting a near fall with a back superplex, Lioness once again gave the "cut throat" sign and did her towerhacker bomb, but Bison still managed to kick out. Lioness took her finisher one step farther, doing a running version of her towerhacker bomb (I’ve never seen this before), which finally put Bison away. The best Jd’ match I’ve seen. These two both have a lot of limitations, mainly because their not 22-years-old anymore, but they did a match that hid their weaknesses. The storyline and psychology were strong throughout. The build was real good, but what should have been a hot finish was totally flattened when the table wouldn’t stand. Since neither woman has an established submission move, the most impressive thing about the match was probably the mileage they got out of submission holds by intelligently working them into the match. 32:34 (22:04 aired). ***1/2

Special Thanks To: Zach Arnold, Joey Assil, Bob Barnett, Glenn Tsunekawa, Koji Yamamoto, & Chris Zavisa