3/23 Miyagi Zepp Sendai: Sambo Oishi vs. Teppei Ishikata. Counters on the mat. They weren't exactly Owen Hart level arm bar counters, but it was a lot more passable than the usual stuff inexperienced guys do. Oishi attacked the knee, already showing a more diverse arsenal than Muto has. Solid. 8:21 of 8:39. *3/4
3/21 K-DOJO: Yasu Urano vs. Kengo Mashimo. Good little match. Real short with no build, but they did what they could and got out rather than looking bad because they were stuck filling time. Mashimo is a worked shoot type while Urano is a Luchador, but Urano was able to hold court in Mashimo's style and find openings to sneak in some of his own. The matwork was pretty good because they kept moving and struggling. There was some hesitation, but these two, though certainly moreso Urano, are the quick athletic type that already do stuff impressively simply on their physical attributes. 6:54. **
3/21 K-DOJO: Daigoro Kashiwa vs. Hi69. Hi looked good on occassion when he made a fast move. For the most part though it was real basic and just plodded along. The match was boring, which is usually the case when you have a headbutt specialist like Kashiwa, but mainly failed because they didn't work well together. 10:00. *
2/24/02 Tokyo Nippon Budokan Triple Threat Match: Gran Naniwa vs. Hi69 vs. Yasu Urano. Lots of backfires and doublecrosses, but the rest of the time one guy would loaf around while the other two wrestled. It started out as a comedy match with the vicious submission circle where one guy would be released when the free guy applied a submission to the guy that was in control, so he would apply a submission to the guy that just caused him to be freed. After 5 minutes they went to the spots, which is where Naniwa went from leader to left behind. 6:54. *1/2
Two Hi69 handheld tag matches from IWA Puerto Rico with no names, dates, or ring entrances. Pablo Marquez is one of the opponents in the first. 5:40 and 5:08
Kunio Toshima vs. Teppei Ishizaka. Basic but well executed match with good impact and stiffness. They had a lot of energy and wrestled with fire and enthusiasm. 6:10. **
Ofune vs. Apple Miyuki. Wrestling was fine, but too much outside interference. 5:40. *
Yoshiya & Mike Lee, Jr. vs. Double X. Goofy match with uninteresting wrestling. 6:59. *
Handicap Man & Woman Mixed Tag Match: Psycho vs. Apple Miyuki & Chikaimajiyoru & DJ Nira. Psycho has Kimala-esque entrance music, but he's skinny and has great ups. 1:43
Kengo Mashimo vs. Sambo Dishi. Good stiff Battlarts type match. Kengo is a good chopper. Short, but Kengo looks like he'll be the real deal and Dishi has skills too. 6:35. **
Man & Woman Mixed Tag Match: Hi69 & Pablo & RYOKO vs. Yasu Urano & Daigoro Kashiwa & Silver Wolf. Silver Wolf's mask is a Tiger Mask variation. He's quick and athletic and was a lot of fun. Urano seems more of a solid but unspectacular Satoru Asako type. RYOKO was out of her depth and more a distraction than anything else. Some great moves and a lot of good ones, but they often showed their inexperience. 9:39. **1/2
Minoru Fujita & Miyawaki vs. Ryota Chikuzen & Joe Aoyama. More brawling and basic spots than I figured on. Fujita just did a smoother more polished version of what the younger guys were doing. Good moves down the stretch, but the match was much too long for what they had to offer and it took 17 minutes to get to that. Fujita's BONEYARD finisher is basically a crossface combined with pulling back the opponent's toe. 18:30. **
Kunio Toshima vs. Teppei Ishizaka
MS: They had a very nice and unique set-up for this show with video screens
and a ramp that made this seem like a different building than Korakuen Hall.
The match itself was pretty basic stuff with most of what aired (about 70%)
consisting of Ishikawa working over Toshima’s arm. However, Toshima
rallied to win with a good looking release backdrop suplex. 4:33 of 7:44.
Ofune vs. Ayako Hamada
MS: Ofune has a pretty cool look and entrance, but not much in the way of
ability to go with it. Ayako, who’s always been helacool (even in CAZAI),
further endeared herself to me by highlighting some of her hair with the
colors of my beloved Colorado Avalanche. She was also generous with Ofune
here by giving her a good amount of offense and selling OK for her as well.
The two problems with the match however were that Ofune doesn’t have
enough offense to put someone with Ayako’s stature in much peril and
her execution left a little to be desired as well. The other thing that held
it down was Ayako not using a lot of her usual set and somwhat dumbing down
her offense to keep Ofune competitive. Ayako did get fairly stiff as the
match went on (but not in a malicious way) including a strong enzugiri that
led to a Ligerbomb for the win. 11:25. *3/4
Kengo Mashimo vs. Isami Kodaka
MS: Not being a huge fan of shoot fighting or worked shoots I didn’t
expect to like this, but despite a slow start Mashimo was so dominant over
the last half of the match that he won me over. They weren’t tremendously
convincing in conveying a shoot, but Mashimo unloaded some serious kicks
and knee lifts towards the end that eventually rendered Kodaka helpless (but
conscious). The final sequence really made the match pretty exciting for
a few moments and turned a potentially pretty bad match into a decent one.
4:42. **
9 Person Surround Force Match: DJ Nira vs. Sambo Dishi vs. Yu Yamagata vs.
Yasu Urano vs. Psycho vs. Mike Lee, Jr. vs. Shoiri Asahi vs. Joe Aoyama vs.
Apple Miyuki
MS: This was under WCW and WWE rules where one pin or submission would decide
the match instead of one survivor doing so. 9 people going about 6-1/2 minutes
was way too much, so this was more a collection of non-flowing spots than
anything else but there were two noticeable storylines throughout. The main
focus was on how everyone wanted at DJ Nira, but he kept managing to escape.
The sub-plot was a very impressive Apple Miyuki being light years better
than I’ve ever seen her look in Jd’. She rolled out some sweet
spots and had to deal with everybody working overly stiff with her. Not being
one that likes to see women vs. men at all this made me wonder how much insecurity
TAKA has about women and how much of that he picked up in McMahonland. But
had she won the match it might’ve been worth it in the end. After she
finally tagged out it became everybody for themselves again except Yamagata
and Dishi, who worked as a team throughout including the finish where Dishi
caught Aoyama with a knee bar (according to the graphic during the replay
this it what it's called) while Yamagata cut-off anyone else from stopping
it. Based on what the match wound up like it may’ve been far better
had they just done Miyuki & Psycho vs. Yamagata & Dishi as they were
the only four who looked good at all. 6:27. *1/4
Mr. X 1 & 2 vs. Mr. X 3 & 5
MS: The low X’s wore black hoods and the highs wore white masks which
was the only way to tell the teams apart. Even though they don’t do
the old Killer Bee’s switch gimmick, they don’t have numbers on
their tights or boots so it’s impossible to tell the teammates apart
being that they are all about the same size. Anyway, this was a pretty lackluster
match with the only notable spot being a double torture rack by the guys
that equal 8. This was also the only match on the show that had no heat whatsoever.
Thanks to the ring announcer we found out that 2 pinned either 3 or 5 after
a couple of running forearms to the back of the loser’s head. After
the match, the whole X clan reunited and raised hands while back in Nashville
Vince Russo sadly lamented about how nobody accepts his X family. 9:17. *1/2
2/3 Falls: Minoru Fujita & Miyawaki & Daigoro Kashiwa & Silver
Wolf & Shinya Makabe vs. TAKA Michinoku & Yoshiya & Ryota Chikuzen
& Hi69 & Pablo
MS: The first fall was only about a minute long. Following a brief exchange
between Fujita and Taka everyone bailed to the floor so that Makabe (who
got a fairly big “surprise” pop and who’s back has more pimples
than DJ Nira AND a 9th grade class combined) could catch Chikuzen in a triangle
choke for the quick tap. The second fall was figuratively and literally the
main body of the match, and had some good but unspectacular back-and-forth
action. TAKA and Fujita let the younger guys carry this fall, but nobody
really distinguished themselves here. However, this section did let us know
that they all have a people’s elblow inspired spot and most of them
look basically the same. Finish saw Yoshiya catch Wolf with the big boot
for the 3. Things really picked up for the deciding fall as the highspots
came rolling out, culminating with TAKA’s patented slingshot moonsault
to the floor. Fujita teased a dive as well, but was cut-off by a nice tornado
DDT by RYOKO. After Minoru managed to avoid Taka for most of the match following
the open, the two controlled most of this segment which was hot throughout.
It finally wound down to Fujita and Makabe punking Taka leading to one of
the weaker Michinoku driver II’s ever (called a Fujita driver by the
graphic) by Fujita on it’s inventer for the win. 18:03. **1/2
highlights from the May 2003 tour
5/4 Sambo Oishi vs. Yu Yamagata 5:11
5/11 highlights
5/17 Dick Togo & Ikuto Hidaka vs. Miyawaki & Daigoro Kashiwa 3:02 of 15:32
5/24:
Kengo Mashimo, Joe Aoyama, & Kunio Toshima vs. Mr. X, X No. 2, & X No. 3 2:02 of 8:18
DJ Nira vs. Cowboy Biri 2:10 of 6:29
Hardcore Kid Kojiro vs. Psycho 2:29 of 7:47
Apple Miyuki vs. Ofune 5:36 of 8:56
UWA Middleweight Championship Match: Yasu Urano vs. Hi69(c) 15:05 of 20:19
3 way tag: Taka Michinoku & Kazma vs. Ryota Chikuzen & Yoshiya vs. Miyawaki & Daigoro Kashiwa 16:41,