Kaientai Dojo: June 9th 2009

A couple of short quick six man matches to start. Yuji Hino was a lot of fun in his match against three of K-Dojo's young guys who I can never distinguish because they are essentially the same guy. I always like his no-sell which backfires spot, and he basically squashes his opponents at the end, setting Randy Takuya (I do, in fact, know the names) up for his powerbomb, temporarily discarding him to lariat Takizawa, then going back to the powerbomb for the win.

Next match is a three-way for the WEW hardcore tag titles, and features Quiet Storm tagging with JOE, Kashiwa and PSYCHO, and the Brahmans. These matches are semi-serious at best, and this had plenty of goofy comedy and a decent share of casual unprotected head shots. This had a couple of spots with the barbed wire board at the end, but the whole thing was pretty uninspired.

I liked the Monster Plant vs. Gurentai six man a lot. There are guys in the Japanese indies that are really at ther best either fighting up or fighting down. Evenly matched matches tend to bring out the worst in people like Sekimoto - they through selling and structure out of the window and replace it with a thousand meaningless repetitions of the same moves. Kengo Mashimo is another decent example. I think he's better than Sekimoto as he tends to tell simpler stories with a more streamlined moveset, but even so, I've seen some thirty minute Mashimo matches where I just want to grab him by his loose fitting trousers and tell him to stop it. All of this is my way of saying that Mashimo vs. Minoru Suzuki works really well. They trade matwork pretty evenly, but once Suzuki stops being sporting and heads outside, Mashimo is always on the backfoot, so the match becomes about the nefarious Gurentai and how Mashimo might make a comeback. Suzuki, for his part, seemed motivated, and doesn't forget to work as well as all that gurning and dickishness. Everyone else plays their roles well - NOSAWA and MAZADA are essentially henchman, triple teaming Yamato then bumping for KAZMA's power stuff, which ensures that the focus remains on Mashimo and Suzuki. The brawling was pretty solid and the finish didn't go on too long - Yamato was the obvious guy to take the fall, and he didn't kickout excessively once he got isolated.

I found myself enjoying the TAKA vs. Sasuke match almost despite my better instincts. Early leg work being blown off for high spots is basically a cliche of current Japanese junior wrestling, and I'd be the first to point this out as bad wrestling in promotions I like less with guys I like less. So, let's try and justify a hypocrisy. Firstly, I liked the build - they went from the leg work, which I liked as it seemed really fighty, with both guys stomping on each other knees in between holds, to less grounded stuff with much less of a clear break. I hate those matches where both guys seem to basically reset, like they fufilled some quota of matwork. The first out-of-ring spots seemed to happen more by accident, which I can buy. It never felt like a match of a thousand finishers, more like a steady progression through bigger and bigger moves. Secondly, they did bring the weak legs back in later - not technically perfect, but a nice touch. I always like Sasuke's borderline comedy exaggerated selling, and the final run of TAKA kicking him in the head before the Michinoku Driver II had plenty of wobbly-legged, glassy-eyed moments. The dives were all suitably insane - TAKA's top rope quebrada took plenty of audience with him. I love how visibly happy Japanese fans are to almost be knocked out in the course of the match. Finally, I think there are intangibles going on here. These are two guys who just match up well, and have so much history together that any match is going to be slick and pleasing to watch. I don't know if TAKA has ever beaten Sasuke in a singles - all those mid-90s matches I watched seemed to have the same finish (and often the same finisher run, which I thought they might be playing off here with the kickouts) - so I guess this might have been presented as a big deal. One of those things lost in translation.