MATCHES FROM THE (personal) VAULT #26

All matches reviewed and dissected today aren’t online unfortunately. I decided to review some whacky stuff from a plethora of shows I’m trying to get through at the moment. Not long now until the greatest indie match list is out so I’m basically trying to watch every indie show from 1990-2010 that I haven’t seen before which is an ever growing list thanks to many great providers of this content. Here’s some cool stuff I watched recently!

TWO OUT OF THREE FALLS: KEITA YANO, NAOSHI SANO & KAGURA VS TARU, BROTHER YASSHI & KENGO – TOKYO TAMA LUCHA 2013

In a true meeting of indie kings YASSHI & Yano start the match in true style by trading holds and stylishly escaping said holds. Yano did his Yano-Ism’s which intrigued the crowd, Yano was 20kgs bigger here then he is now but he still moved well for a chubby dude. Fucking love TARU, not necessarily the man you want to bring home to your parents but a beast within the squared circle nonetheless. TARU taking bumps for Naoshi Sano in front of 100 people was sick. KAGURA/Taro Yamada is so freakin underrated, just an incredible polished indie lucharesu high flyer of which not many populate the scene nowadays, another one that spent lots of time in Mexico and even making quite a few dates for AAA during the 00’s. Voodoo Murderers return for one night only on an upcoming AJPW show so that should be sick, sadly YASSHI isn’t involved so it’s not as cool as it could be. YASSHI pinned Sano following a double reverse brain buster from he and Kengo for the first fall of the match. Yano had the entire crowd ‘HUSSING’ just as he accidentally wiped out the referee with a helluva kick, moments later Yano pins Kengo with a whacky lucha roll up. KEITA WITH A FARGO STRUT, KEITA WITH A “YES” CHANT! Sano & Yano showed great cohesion and almost took out YASSHI before he was saved by his teammates. TARU nailed a choke bomb and lariat for respective near falls, the lariat was sickening! Kagura kicked out of a head kick for a big pop. TARU DRILLER! Things are all over and Voodoo pick up the W, great match!

RATING – GREAT

TAKAKU FUKE VS SURVIVAL TOBITA – FUCK 3/28/2010

Takaku Fuke is a guy who has fought Masakatsu Funaki, Minoru Suzuki & Bas Rutten yet here he is in 2010 wrestling in the FUCK shed 2.0 in front of 5 fans against one of the biggest indie all stars of the last 25 years in Survival Tobita. Fuke always physically looks good, such an underrated member of the sleaze indies. Tobita tried to match Fuke’s kicks but little old Tobita was no match. Tobita gave Fuke a very nice vertical suplex. It’s just incredible to me that we have this kind of footage available so easily as international viewers, like you gotta know the right people but man it’s truly blessed times when we’ve got a tape like this to watch. This FUCK tape started with Tobita wandering the streets, filming/walking past the homeless, as dirty and gritty as you can get. Tobita made Fuke bleed heavily, this is awesome. The giant knife is making Fuke’s head resemble a busted watermelon, gross stuff. Tobita no sold a bunch of head kicks but Fuke finally dropped him with a palm strike, genuinely awesome back drop suplex from a bloodied Fuke! Fuke runs to the back to grab a giant ass light tube which he broke over the Saitama Pro original, he then comes back with 5 more massive light tubes which he puts to great use. Fuke chokes out Tobita and that’s that! Loved all of this, LONG LIVE THE SLEAZE! Tobita went crazy after the match, the two continued brawling with great disdain for one another.

RATING – AMAZING

MASAKAZU FUKUDA VS KOKI KITAHARA – WYF 9/19/1998

The match prior on the show involved Mochi, TARU & Okumura so the crowd was a bit drained for energy after seeing all their favourites so these two had to work to make this match work. The two were evenly matched to start the contest, Kitahara got tired of that real quickly so he laid in some brutal elbows that echoed through the arena. Fukuda was very fresh but I wouldn’t say he was green because he was more than able to hold his own against the more established Koki. They brawled to the outside, Fukuda got a stiff chair shot to the head. The entire WYF originals roster is out to support their boy. Fukuda just managed to kick out of a spine crumpling powerbomb which pumped up the crowd, he recovered and landed a nice STO for a two count. Great German suplex from the Fukuda, really fun brutal match! Kitahara finally ended Fukuda’s valiant effort with a shotei palm strike from hell.

RATING – 5.5/10

TIGER MASK, GREAT SASUKE & GRAN HAMADA VS TORYU, DIABLO & MR POGO – EL GRAN HAMADA PRODUCE 12/26/2010

They brawled for minutes in the crowd before the bell officially began to ring. This is quite a whacky match on the day after Christmas in front of 100 fans but I’m completely here for it. Got some great workers and legit legends so it should be a fun time. Gran Hamada was busted early on following Pogo’s bandy work, Toryu and Kishiwada are great henchmen for Mr. Pogo… They could have been a fantastic unit in a promotion like Dragon Gate with Pogo as the manager/boss but that’s just all fantasy booking nonsense. The crowd were excited to see all the legends but the match is a bit boring and the crowd are reacting like a bored crowd would. Pogo’s back in the ring and cutting Hamada’s forehead to pieces with his sickle. Pogo’s digging his sickle deep into Hamada’s back like he did to Onita oh so many times in FMW. POGO WITH THE FIRE BALL TO SASUKE! That woke up the crowd oh my goodness! Shortly after Hamada connects with a great looking tornado ddt, top rope hurricanrana combo before he and Tiger apply stereo arm locks to Diablo. Hamada wins with botched hurricanrana, fun little match that had blood with three decent high spots.

RATING – 4/10