Kaientai Dojo 9th August 2009

I watched the openers at some point in the past, and had no desire to rewatch a battle royale or PSYCHO vs. Quiet Storm again. I have no memories of either being any good.

First real match of interest was Minoru Suzuki vs. Kengo Mashimo. Most of this was perfectly decent - two guys knocking seven bells out of each other is hard to get wrong. Mashimo gets smart first and targets Suzuki's arm with loads of kicks and a couple of armbars. The fight against the submissions is too long - drama builds for a while, but it soon becomes apparent there isn't going to be a submission, which means it peters out. The long-term selling is a bit suspect - Mashimo blows off Suzuki's early attacks to launch a comeback, whilst Suzuki isn't too emphasise his damaged arm. That aside, I liked the strike exchange at the finish, with Suzuki ducking and diving, and the chance opportunity to lock in the rear naked choke felt in keeping with a match where Suzuki was higher ranked but was mostly coming from behind.

Next up, TAKA vs. Kashiwa for the title. I gave this two watches, because the first one left me completely surprised. Basically, it boils down to this: given the opportunity, Daigora Kashiwa might be one of the best wrestlers in Japan that nobody talks about. Nobody. He's like Tamon Honda in that he completely doesn't look like what popular Japanese wrestlers look like in 2010, and his style isn't particularly pretty, but it is very effective and like basically nothing within the current indie scene. He has two basic weapons: his headbutts, which he uses like chops or kicks as his go-to offence, and a camel clutch which he regularly looks to get TAKA in position to lock in. The headbutts come from all angles and are targetted against all limbs - TAKA occassionaly looks completely surprised by this, as another headbutt strikes him in the midriff or the hip or the arm. Near the end, he combines the two, headbutting TAKA in the back of the skull whilst fighting to keep him in the hold.

TAKA is mostly along for the ride here, but to his credit he keeps in simple and responds to the camel clutch attempts with his own submission hold (whatever he calls that). My favourite part of the match was where Kashiwa fights out of this with headbutts to the arm to weaken the hold. This is a match with plenty of scrambling for position and fighting for holds, which I really liked. Add to this a fun opening where Kashiwa surprises TAKA mid-streamer shower and a really great finish where TAKA can't hold onto the headlock submission so shifts to this leg-scissor version that Kashiwa can't escape from. Had I seen this earlier, it would have made my Japanese top 10 at least, and probably higher.

The main event, Oishi and Asahi vs. YOSHIYA and GENTARO, was predictably mindless. Loads of back and forth with no real structure or anything more long-term than the present second and occassionally the one after that, all capped off with a rubbish looking finish - whatever there awful assisted Canadian Destoyer is called, GENTARO jumped right out of it. However, let me reinterate: everyone, track down the title match. It's really good.