#PuroresuRewind

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Puroresu-Rewind #1 :  Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama vs. Shinya Hashimoto & Yuji Nagata (ZERO-ONE March 2nd 2001)

Zero-One’s Official Youtube

Video of the match

This is the first in a hopefully long running series I will do looking at an older Japanese match. 

I’m starting with Puroresu-Rewind, but it’ll have two sister series called Lucha Libre Time Machine and another called Lucharesu Rewind Machine where I look at classic Lucha from Japan or Japanese talents wrestling in Mexico.

I decided to start with Puroresu-Rewind because thus far all the content on the blog has been CMLL related. I love CMLL, but I love all wrestling and don’t want to have tunnel vision. So today we are looking at :  

Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama vs. Shinya Hashimoto & Yuji Nagata (ZERO-ONE March 2nd 2001)

Who’s who?

Mitsuharu Misawa 

Wearing his signature green and white pants, Misawa is arguable the best wrestler of all time his name coming up in any GOAT discussions that have Puroresu fans. 

One of the Four Corners of Heaven(4 Famous wrestlers from AJPW) and a man that has more 5* matches than most with 25 Meltzer rated 5* matches and a coveted 6* match. 

Don’t just take Meltzer's word for it, Tokyo Sports gives year end wrestling awards and has since the late 70′s and they have given him 5 MOTY awards(1995, 1997, 1998, 2003 and 2007). 

Also, Misawa was #2 in the PWI 500(1997) who are famously focused on the United States/WCW/WWE wrestling scene. The person above Misawa on the list in 1997 was Dean Malenko for those curious. Misawa was in the PWI top 10 5 times in his career, the list only being a thing since 1991.

Misawa would be the big star for AJPW until he decided to make his own promotion in the year 2000 called NOAH. This is one of the 2 shows that Misawa did for Zero-One wrestling, which was the promotion that Hashimoto created in 2001.

Jun Akiyama

Wearing white trunks and boots, Akiyama was about 5 years younger than Misawa. He and Misawa had many 5 star matches through the late 90′s tag teaming together. Jun Akiyama would also be a big star for Misawa in NOAH, being champion there many times. In 2013 Akiyama would leave NOAH with many other NOAH talents and join AJPW. Where he worked as a wrestler for about a year before AJPW made him the president, which he currently still is while also being an active wrestler for the company as well. 

Shinya Hashimoto

Shinya Hashimoto is the host in this situation, Zero-One wrestling being a company he created. This event was the first ever Zero-One PPV and this match was the first main event. Wearing black pants and a red belt, which is common for him to wear. Hashimoto is known for his martial arts style and signature high kicks... which are well displayed in this match. 

He initially wanted Zero-One to be an independent affiliate to NJPW and perhaps even be called NJPW Zero-One. NJPW refused and would later fire Hashimoto, so he registered Zero-One and created a new wrestling brand for the 21st century. Zero-One was an open promotion that had working agreements with almost all the companies of Japan allowing Zero-One talents to wrestle elsewhere and hold other promotions belts. 

Shinya Hashimoto and Mitsuharu Misawa have many things in common, they both founded wrestling promotions that defined the independent scene in Japan after the turn of the century, they were both the top stars of NJPW/AJPW respectively, they both are known for their stiff work, They both are considered the leading member of Japanese groups. Misawa being the top Four Corners guy and Hashimoto considered the best of his group The Three Musketeers. 

Perhaps the most grim thing that Misawa/Hashimoto have in common is their early passing. Misawa famously died in the ring after he took one bump too many causing a cervical spinal cord injury he was 46 in 2009, while Hashimoto died of a brain aneurysm when he was only 40 years old in 2005, a year after he stepped down from Zero-One amongst financial issues. 

Yuji Nagata

Much like Jun Akiyama, Nagata is slightly younger than his partner, though is still older than Jun by 2 years. Yuji Nagata would not be a staple of Zero-One, instead Nagata has been a very loyal NJPW talent. The only year of his career that Nagata worked more for another company is in 1997 when he wrestled for WCW, who he also worked with in 1998 about as much as NJPW. Roughly 40-50 matches for both companies in 1998.

He is wearing Blue trunks and boots here dressed similarly to Jun Akiyama, but different colors. He is pretty well highlighted here and looks pretty good. Him teaming with Hashimoto vs Misawa and Jun Akiyama is basically a matchup of NJPW(Nagata)+Zero-One(Hashimoto) vs AJPW+NOAH(Misawa/Akiyama)

How is the match?

Really good! It’s a fantastic main event for a first show. It’s almost hard to believe your eyes because these talents are so well associated with other big brands. Hashimoto vs Misawa, singles match never happened as far as I know. So seeing them fight here is really interesting, It’s akin to Hogan vs Flair or Stone Cold vs Goldberg, or Sting vs Undertaker. It’s definitely dream match material and we got it briefly in this main event tag match from Zero-One. 

It’s hard not to smile watching this match because you are seeing 4 of the best men to lace up boots all tossing fists and one another around the ring. It’s a brisk 20 minutes that passed by quickly because there really isn’t much fussing around. It’s a stiff fight where Hashimoto nails some of his signature high kicks, Nagata and Akiyama trade suplexes, Nagata hits his rolling kick, and Misawa/Hashimoto clashing is akin to Godzilla vs King King. Two icons throwing down in a test of who’s the best. 

My main complaint with this match is one that’s made in hindsight. Perhaps, Hashimoto was hoping to get these three other men more often in his promotion. It seems weird for the first main event to feature 3 talents that wouldn’t work that often in this promotion. 

Perhaps another NJPW talent who became a mainstay in Zero-One would have been better like Shinjiro Otani. I’ll fully admit this is just in hindsight criticism, because Hashimoto might have thought NOAH/Zero-One crossovers would have been more common than they really were. 

People also might not like the ending because it’s a little abrupt, but I think it works well because at least it’s conclusive. It’s not a time limit draw or a countout(Which are prevalent in many old AJPW matches). They had a winner and a loser, even if the ending is hectic with all four men involved in the action and the security coming after the match to pry Hashimoto off Jun Akiyama.

Leaving this match, my one sore spot is the fact we never got the Hashimoto/Misawa match of our dreams. It’s a shame Hashimoto passed as early as he did. Misawa had a classic 5* and Tokyo Sports MOTY tag match in NOAH in 2007, and was still an active wrestler til his death in 2009. 

Hashimoto vs Misawa could have been a barnburner match for the ages, but was lost to time and unfortunate circumstances. This tag match is a great glimpse at what could have been, but also is a greater glimpse of what was. A photograph in time of some of the best workers to ever set foot in a ring, all in one ring.

Zero-One has had a bumpy road over the last 16 years, but it's still standing! While they may never have a main event with as much starpower/linage as their first, many great talents have worked their over the years. Guys like Steve Corino, Samoa Joe, Low Ki, Ikuto Hidaka, and of course Shinjiro Otani who has been their since the beginning. It’s nice to know that despite their passings both Hashimoto and Misawa’s legacies live on through promotions they created. 

Puroresu-Rewind #1 : Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama vs. Shinya Hashimoto & Yuji Nagata (ZERO-ONE March 2nd 2001) Highlights

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Puroresu-Rewind #3 : BxB Hulk(c) vs Uhaa Nation for Open The Dream Gate Title (Dragon Gate 03/01/2015)

Video Link via Rutube

Who’s who?

Uhaa Nation is better known as Apollo Crews now on WWE programming. Before making his WWE debut he would be a staple of Dragon Gate. Calling it his home promotion from 2011-2014, though he wrestled no matches for them in 2012 when he suffered a knee injury that sidelined him for most of that year.

Despite those years in the company Apollo Crews only ever held one title/accolade. That being the Open the Twin Gate Championship in 2013 with the person he is taking on in this match BxB Hulk. The two held those belts for 64 days, which is a pretty middle of the road reign.

BxB Hulk joined Dragon Gate in 2005, the 2nd year of the promotions existence. It being founded in July 2004 by Takashi Okumura, Most of the wrestlers being graduates of Último Dragón's Toryumon Gym. 

It should be no surprise that Hulk who has been with the company since basically the start has more reigns under his belt. 7x Triangle gate champion, 4x Twin gate champion, and having won Summer Adventure Tag League twice and King of Gate Tournament. 

This has thus far been his only Open The Dream Gate Title one of 13 people who have held that belt over 22 reigns. BxB’s reign is 3rd most successful having 7 successful defenses, right behind the 2nd most successful Naruki Doi with 8 defenses and a bit behind CIMA’s top reign which had 13 successful defenses.  

BxB is also the inaugural Open the Freedom Gate Championship which was the Dragon Gate US belt. BxB had 7 defenses for that belt too, though was completely behind #1 with that belt : Johnny Gargano who had 22 defenses as champion. Sadly Dragon Gate US is dormant atm and the belt is also no longer around, Timothy Hatcher gave the belt to Gargano... who is assumed to still be in position of it. 

How’s the match?

Great! I’ll be honest in saying that I went with this match both because it was highly rated on Cagematch.net and because I know most people are aware of Apollo Crews now that he is in the WWE machine. I heard his time in Dragon Gate was good and wanted to look into it for myself, so here we are!

Much like the NOAH match I covered recently, this match has a very breakneck pace from beginning to end. Which might not be everyone’s cup of tea. The cliche being old timers shaking their fists at this match screaming, ‘MUH PSYCHOLOGY!’ I think that would be an unwarranted complaint here. 

There is a misconception in wrestling that the only reason to work a body part is to lead to a submission finish. This match and BxB Hulk prove that misconception as foolish and Uhaa Nation perfectly sells the hurt leg throughout the match. One could argue that he starts selling it a little early, it feels like Hulk got one submission hold off and Uhaa’s leg was destroyed, but I do enjoy that Uhaa never lets you forget his leg is hurt. Neither does BxB as kicks almost always target Uhaa’s leg. 

I mentioned it earlier, but this felt very similar to Katsuhiko Nakajima (c) vs Brian Cage for the GHC Title over in NOAH. Cage/Uhaa Nation both play the powerhouse role, while Nakajima/BxB Hulk are the homegrown guys who’ve been around for ages and were currently the reigning champion. I also liked both about the same. Both are excellent and both are also great gateway matches for North American viewers like myself who know one of the guys from work outside that indiependent Japanese promotion. I’d recommend both of them to people who have never tried either. I’m interested in digging deeper into both NOAH and Dragon Gate in the coming months. 

4.5/5

Highlights : 

BxB Hulk(c) vs Uhaa Nation for Open The Dream Gate Title (Dragon Gate 03/01/2015)

[lostinyourears]

Puroresu-Rewind #2 :  Giant Baba (c) [PWF] vs. Verne Gagne (c) [AWA] 2/3 falls Champion vs Champion (AJPW 1/18/81)

Playlist of the 3 videos which were all uploaded by account Pronkb000

(Card with Guide)

Who’s Who?

Verne Gagne is famously the co-founder of American Wrestling Association with promoter Wally Karbo. Initially called NWA Minneapolis(Boxing & Wrestling Club) before they broke away from NWA in the late 50′s and in 1960 became AWA. AWA was a major promotion into the late 80′s before basically being pushed down a tier by the big 2 : NWA and WWF.

AWA would close its doors in 1991, but not before employing talents that would later go on to be stars for those other 2 major companies like :  "Mean Gene" Okerlund, manager Bobby Heenan,  Scott Hall, The Midnight Rockers (Shawn Michaels and Marty Jannetty), "Bull Power" Leon White (later known as Big Van Vader), The Nasty Boys, Madusa Miceli and Curt Hennig who famously held their main title a little over a year from May of ‘87 to May of ‘88.

Verne Gagne’s wrestling career started in 1949 when he would have been 23 and continued to wrestle into the 1980′s with ‘81 listed as his retirement on wikipedia, though he did have some more wrestling appearances until ‘86 in AWA when he would have been 60. He held the AWA Heavyweight title 10 times in his career and was a big star there along with Nick Bockwinkel,  Mad Dog Vachon and The Crusher. 

Perhaps more notable than his wrestling career, is his career as a trainer. Having trained over 100 wrestlers in his time as co-founder of AWA. Along with those noted above, he also trained : Ricky Steamboat, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Scott Norton and Bob Backlund.

Giant Baba was similarly famous for being the founder of AJPW. He and Antonio Inoki both wrestled for the first wrestling promotion of Japan : Japanese Wrestling Association or JWA. It’s founder(Rikidozan) was murdered in 1963, which really hurt it’s management. Both Inoki(NJPW) and Baba(AJPW) would found companies in 1972 with JWA biting the dust in 1973 with both the new promotions eating its lunch and taking its audience. 

In the early years of both AJPW and NJPW their main stars were their founders. Giant Baba having the first reign with AJPW’s PWF belt a staggering 1,920 day reign, the next longest reign being Baba with 1,354 days and the 3rd longest reign also being Baba at 364 days before finally 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th reigns were all Stan Hansen before Baba shows up again with the 8th longest.  

Outside of his own promotion, in JWA during the 60′s before AJPW became a thing he also had 3 long reigns with the NWA International Heavyweight title each being over 600 days and the shortest only ending because he left JWA to go form AJPW. Baba much like Gagne retired at the age of 60 in 1998. Sadly, unlike Gagne he didn’t live for another 30 years instead passing away in 1999 at the age of 61. 

Baba’s last notable bouts were probably in 1995 when he was in the World Tag League. With most years after that just having Baba in dozens of 3 on 3 AJPW tag matches. After Baba passed away Mitsuharu Misawa would inherit the duty of president for a short stint before he much like Baba before him left the established company to create his own promotion : NOAH. AJPW still operates today, unlike AWA which as noted closed in the early 90′s. 

How’s the match?

Ehhhhhhh.... It’s a match from 1981? While a match I covered recently(Tatsumi Fujinami © vs Chavo Guerrero) was from 1980 and did hold up pretty well, I think that’s in great part to the Junior Division of NJPW being ahead of their time. That being said even Inoki’s World League matches from around this time are head and shoulders above this bout. I think Inoki is generally considered a better worker than Baba, but I can’t confidently say that as my opinion. Because I haven’t watched enough of Baba, or Inoki for that matter. This is... this is a rocky start for my exposure to Baba. 

I mean a big sign of how this match is, can be summed up by starting the match. Baba and Gagne do maybe 1 thing of note... then a wipe happens and 10 minutes have passed. This seems like an edit by AJPW... which is pretty sad. Even they were like... yea ten minutes pass and nothing of note really happened. It was very, very, very bizarre to me. 

Also, because of that wipe I feel like I cannot really give this a proper rating. Maybe... in that ten minutes Gagne pulled out a canadian destroyer and Baba did a corkscrew plancha or some crazy exchange. While I’m joking, it is hard to judge a 24 minute match when 10 minutes of it is skipped. 

Some matches like Chavo/Tatsumi almost feel timeless and even in 2040 will probably still be a spectacle if you are in the right mindset. This isn’t one of those matches, it’s very much of the time and like lots of Hogan’s WWF output from the 80′s just feels limited, not enough happening out of each man’s signature spots.  

Where it does shine is showcasing two talents who really were mega stars in the 60′s and 70′s this is the tail end for both and especially Verne Gagne who on paper properly retired this year. It’s also a once in a lifetime match. They never fought before and never fought after. 

What really ends up killing it for me is the inconclusive finish. A cliche/stereotype/common complaint with AJPW especially in the 80′s and early 90′s is the dreaded draw. Which this match has. Verne wins the first, Baba the second and the third ends via countout. 

AAHHHHH the dreaded AJPW countout. It’s led to great matches feeling lackluster and in this match that feels dated it takes it from an ‘Okay, but dated match’ to a just ‘who cares?’. An interesting time piece, but I’m certain both men have dozens if not hundreds of better matches under their respective promotion founding belts. 

This is really the first match I’ve covered on this tumblr/blog that I wouldn’t suggest watching. It’s interesting and two icons of mid-century wrestling, but the ending kinda kills it for me. It’s free though and really will only cost you time.

Highlights :