Puroresu Show Reviews

We begin this April 1st, 2006 edition of Big Japan Death Match Wars with a look back to the last Korakuen Hall show where Takashi Sasaki won the Death Match title off Abdullah Kobayashi in a brutal match where Sasaki had a nail stub stuck to the back of his head penetrating his skull! The new champion is back in action tonight, and in a 6-man tag death match no less!

Shadow WX & Mammoth Sasaki VS Yuko Miyamoto & Shinobu
I was surprised at the amount of offense the 666 tandem of Shinobu & Miyamoto got in this match despite the immense size difference between them and the Big Japan tag champions. They didn’t necessarily had to rely only on their speed, but actually took it toe-to-toe with the big men Shinobu being able to take down WX after a series of Sex Bomber lariats, and Miyamoto was actually able to overhead belly-to-belly suplex Sasaki!
I really like the ending of the match where both teams did a series of tandem offense moves, the way good tag wrestling is supposed to be about! When the 666 team thought they had things going their way and were about to pull off a huge upset, the tag champions rebounded with two sick lariats in stereo, followed by a pair of brainbusters to take the win. The champions were obviously impressed by the new comers since you tell from the looks on their faces after the match that they seriously underestimated this team and gave them props after the match.
For the record, my favorite spot of the match was the “audience interaction” big where Mammoth gave a chair to a guy in the audience, asking him to hold it while he smacked Shinobu’s head into it ^_^.
Match Rating: **

Backstage and despite recently losing his title to Sasaki, Kobayashi (still heavily scarred from the title match), Numazawa (still bandaged up) and Sekimoto are still able to laugh and crack jokes to THE COMEDY MUSIC!
Jump to Team Go Forward (Ito & Sasaki), and Sasaki (with a heavily bandaged head) is talking about his title win. Ito suddenly jokes around, wanting his shot at Sasaki’s belt and tries to take it from him. The main event is next!

Light Tube Death Match: Ryuji Ito, Takashi Sasaki & MASADA VS Abdullah Kobayashi, Daisuke Sekimoto & Jaki Numazawa
Surprisingly, this actually was a tag match, and not the usual six-man scrambles these types of matches tend to be. I’m guessing it’s probably because of Sasaki’s condition, and you really got to give him credit for getting back in there this early and letting a maniac like Numazawa stab a light tube where the nail stub penetrated his skull! He even took another Koba-driver in the match.
Still, the match did have it’s fair share of six-man brawling, and I got to see my favorite Big Japan foreigner MASADA in action! And he did the flaming punch too! Just how does he do that?!? There was also a cool spot where Sekimoto caught Ito out of mid air out on the floor, and used him as a weapon to take out Sasaki and MASADA before giving him a death-valley bomb on the floor.
The finish of the match saw Numazawa hit his rolling senton off the top through a bundle of light tubes on MASADA to pick up the win for his team, and post match Numazawa put in his bid to challenge Sasaki for his newly won Death Match title.
Fun match, and using the standard tag rules for this one made it more interesting than the usual brawls.
Match Rating: **1/2

Post match, Numazawa does his sexy-pants promo, again putting in his bid to challenge for the title. And Ito playfully tries to steal Sasaki’s title belt before again saying he’d like a shot for the belt at some time. Why doesn’t MASADA get any promo time?!?

Labels: BJW

Korakuen Hall 3/31/06 Pt.1
We begin with a look back to Abdullah Kobayashi winning the Death Match Title off Ryuji Ito back in December, and the build up to Takashi Sasaki becoming Kobayashi’s first challenger for the title. During the official press conference, Kobayashi brings out a basket full of nail stubs that will be used in the title match at Korakuen Hall. Those things look nasty!

Hardcore 6-Man Tag: Ryuji Ito, Jaki Numazawa & Daikokubo Benkei VS Kintaro Kanemura, Saburo Inematsu & Asian Cougar
I thought that these were two rather odd pairings.
The match was clipped down quite a bit (we didn’t see how Numazawa got busted open), but was still rather fun. I rather enjoyed seeing Benkei in a serious role again, as he played the immovable obstacle that the Apache Army had to get past. Big rub to Saburo Inematsu for being able to powerslam the big guy, with a little assist from his partners. And there was one rather funny bit where Benkei splashed Kanemura while he had Ito in an STF! They probably should have ended the match when everyone piled onto Benkei after Kanemura hit the diving senton, but Benkei managed to kick out with 3 guys on top of him!
Instead, the finish came with Ito cleaning house with a wooden board, followed by Benkei hitting an assisted Liger-bomb on Inematsu, Ito diving off the top with a big moonsault, and Benkei hitting the big splash for the pin. A bit on the short side, but still fun none the less.
Match Rating: *1/2

Another quick look back at the build up of Takashi Sasaki, followed by some comments from the challenger and champion. Kobayashi demonstrates the sharpness of the nails by dropping a tomato on them and watching it get impaled.

BJW Death Match Title - Light Tubes & Nail Board Death Match: Abdullah Kobayashi [C] VS Takashi Sasaki
You can feel the intensity when these two locked eyes and never broke off contact once they entered the ring, not even during the ring introductions. I sort of dread these matches sometimes when the ropes are all lined with light tubes and the audience are in such close proximity with the ring. There’s also a light tube cabin and a bucket of nail stubs in each neutral corner of the ring.
Starts with both men trying to muscle each other into the light tubes. Kobayashi clamps on a wrist-lock, but Sasaki flips out of it, grabs a light tube off the ropes, and breaks it over Kobayashi’s head! Sasaki now with a rear wrist lock, but Kobayashi powers out of it, and gets behind him with one of his own. Sasaki grabs another light tube, switches around and whacks Kobayashi on the back of the head with it! Sasaki tries to whip Kobayashi into the light tubes, but he manages to put the brakes on. Sasaki tries it again, but Kobayashi reverses it and Sasaki breaks into the light tubes! Kobayashi whips Sasaki again hard into the light tubes. The champion grabs a big bundle of light tubes and tries to break it over Sasaki’s head, but the challenger dodges it and kicks Kobayashi low. Sasaki rebounds off the ropes and misses a sliding dropkick, leaving himself open for Kobayashi to smash the light tube bundle over his head! Kobayashi follows up with a big dropkick, sending Sasaki into the light tube lined ring ropes again.
They exit the ring, and Kobayashi digs a nail stub into Sasaki’s head! Sasaki reverses an Irish whip and sends Kobayashi into the front row. Sasaki whacks the champion with a chair several times before sending him to the other side and breaking a light tube over his head. Back in the ring, Sasaki delivers several hard kicks to Kobayashi, he then switches to breaking light tubes by kicking them into the champion’s body! Kobayashi fights off a scoop-slam attempt, but is dropped by several hard knees to the mid-section before Sasaki breaks a light tube bundle over his head. Sasaki goes for the bucket of nail stubs and empties it out in the middle of the ring! Sasaki tries to slam Kobayashi, but the champion blocks it and tries to slam Sasaki on them. Sasaki floats over and rebounds off the ropes, but Kobayashi catches him with a powerslam onto the nail stubs! Kobayashi than backdrop suplexes Sasaki off the apron to the floor! Both men are bloody and down.
Kobayashi recovers first and sets up Sasaki on a table before going up the corner post and diving down with a Bakachinga Press through the table on the challenger! Kobayashi back up on the apron again, and this time he just drops a bundle of light tubes, breaking over Sasaki’s head as he gets up! Kobayashi takes a bite out of a light tube and spits the glass in Sasaki’s face! Sasaki than puts a nail stub in his mouth before digging it into Sasaki’s forehead. The champion than slams Sasaki down and places some light tubes on him before stomping them down on his groin! Kobayashi than digs a broken light tube into Sasaki’s already bleeding head. Sasaki tries to fight back with punches and kicks, but Kobayashi rakes and digs a nail stub in his head! Kobayashi slams Sasaki down in the center of the ring with a Samoan drop, then delivers the Bakachinga elbow drop with light tubes for a 2 count.
Kobayashi sets up a light tube cabin, but Sasaki recovers in time to catch Kobayashi with a kick in the chin. Sasaki tries to suplex Kobayashi onto the cabin, but Kobayashi counters it. Sasaki floats over and tries to German suplex the champion on the cabin! They switch around several times and Kobayashi escapes Sasaki’s waist lock with a back elbow to the head. Kobayashi runs off the ropes, but Sasaki catches him with a backdrop onto the light tube cabin! Kobayashi chant starts up now as the champ struggles to his feet, but is met by several whacks to the head with a wooden board by Sasaki! Sasaki tries for a tornado DDT, but Kobayashi overpowers the move and swings Sasaki back onto the corner post, so Sasaki breaks a light tube over Kobayashi’s head instead before spiking the champion with a jump swinging DDT out of the corner!
Sasaki rebounds off the ropes with a big kick to the head for a 2 count. Sasaki goes up top and hits a missile dropkick. He goes up top again, but Kobayashi recovers and breaks two light tube bundles over his head! Kobayashi sets up another light tube cabin, than gives Sasaki a Samoan drop off the top through them! The champ only gets a 2 count though. He slams Sasaki down near the corner and sets another cabin on his body before going up the second rope and delivering an inverted corner press (Vader-bomb) for another 2 count! Kobayashi tries to whack Sasaki with a bundle of light tubes, but Sasaki catches them, so Kobayashi head butts them into Sasaki’s head! He than gives Sasaki a weak looking Shining Wizard for another near fall. Abby Jr. sets up Sasaki in the corner where the nail stubs are, and looks to want to superplex the challenger on them, but Sasaki slips under and slams the champ out of the corner onto the nail stubs!
Sasaki on the offensive now with a series of hard kicks which knocks down the champion for a 2 count. Sasaki sets up a big bundle of light tubes in the ring and looks to try to D-Geist (Emerald Frosion) Kobayashi onto them, but the champion counters and pick up Sasaki off his feet and gives him the Koba-Driver onto the nail stubs! OH MY GAWD! TWO STUBS ARE STUCK IN HIS HEAD! And one of them is REALLY deep in! Kobayashi covers for a 2 count as a huge “Sasaki” chant starts up. Kobayashi sets a bundle of light tubes on Sasaki and goes up top to hit a big Bakachinga elbow drop for a 2.5! Kobayashi grabs a HUGE bundle of light tubes from under the ring and piledrives Sasaki before placing them on him and going up top again. Sasaki recovers in time and tries to superplex Kobayashi onto the bundle, but Kobayashi knocks him off the top, but the big man himself misses the Bakachinga elbow and crashes onto the bundle of light tubes!
Sasaki hits a pair of stiff lariats which stagger the champion. He tries for a third, but Kobayashi ducks and catches Sasaki with a release German suplex! Remember Sasaki still has that nail stub stuck in the back on his head! Sasaki is able to block a Shining Wizard attempt and hit a big buzzsaw kick to the head, followed by a big time lariat for a 2.8! Sasaki sets up several light tube bundles onto the nail stubs and gives Kobayashi the D-Geist onto them, but only gets a 2.9! Sasaki hits several quick kicks to the head followed by breaking a bundle of light tubes with a big kick to Kobayashi’s head and covers him to finally score the 3 count and win the Death Match Title!!!
This match was really hard to watch once that nail stub got stuck in Sasaki’s head! Definitely one of the sickest things I’ve ever seen, and it didn’t help that they’d zoom in on it every time we saw the back of his head! Kudos to Sasaki for being able to continue the match in that condition, even if the match was still heavily one sided. Kobayashi is definitely a good death match wrestler, but he’s more of a spot wrestler than actually being able to carry the match with wrestling ability like Ryuji Ito can.
Match Rating: ***

Wrestlers quickly rush the ring to check on Sasaki, and they even attempt to pull the nail stub out of his head before thinking better of it and just leaving it there so the proper medical authorities can take a look at it. Sasaki seems OK as he cuts a promo on Kobayashi, who congratulates him on the win before promising to win the title back. Sasaki than calls out Ryuji Ito and wants to defend the title against him to avenge his loss to him from last year. Sasaki thanks the crowd for supporting him and Big Japan before finally leaving. The show closes out with Kobayashi giving comments while greeting fans at the merchandise table all bloodied up still, than Sasaki being interviewed by the press with the nail stub still stuck in his head!

Korakuen Hall 3/31/06 Pt.2
Death Match Wars #72 kicks off with Katsumasa Inoue & Hiroyuki Kondo doing a press conference announcing their challenge for the BJW Tag Titles. Inoue has a score to settle with the champions as they busted his mouth open pretty bad with a wicked chair attack the last time they met. They than demonstrated their new tandem move where Inoue does a diving head butt off Kondo’s shoulders off the top rope, but ended up short of the target on each attempt! They were still confident they would the titles though.

BJW Tag Titles: Shadow WX & Mammoth Sasaki [C] VS Team Wakazaguri (Katsumasa Inoue & Hiroyuki Kondo)
Fun tag match with a lot of tandem moves thrown out by both sides. Team Wakazaguri came really close to winning the belts, and they had the right strategy attacking their bigger opponents with tandem moves, as well as some new, and rather bizarre looking, double team moves. They did manage to perfect that diving head butt move of theirs too. The champions unfortunately had the size and power advantage, as well as the hardcore advantage when they brought some chairs into the match. The big men hit some good tag moves themselves, and the stereo brainbusters they did was a cool visual. Mammoth picks up the win after planting Inoue with a 29-Years Old on a chair.
Match Rating: **1/2

Daisuke Sekimoto & Yoshihito Sasaki VS Masato Tanaka & Tetsuhiro Kuroda
Usually, unless your NJPW, the whole purpose of bringing outsiders is to get them to put over your own talent, but by the end of this one I seriously felt that Yoshihito Sasaki came out looking better than Sekimoto. Sure, Sekimoto had some heated exchanges with Tanaka, as well as scoring several near falls, but Sasaki looked stronger the way absorbed some big time offense and showed his never say die attitude. The two of them were even able to put together some cool double team moves, like Sasaki hitting the Argentine Coaster followed by a Sekimoto using his dead lift German suplex for a near fall. And there was a great visual moment when Sasaki & Sekimoto had both their opponents up in Argentine Backbreakers while out in the audience! I thought maybe they were going to battering ram them together from that position!
Give credit to Tanaka for still being able to work and bump like a monster despite his never healing shoulder injury. And Kuroda was fun to watch as well even if his offense is getting rather redundant. A fun match overall that was nicely built up with a great heated finish with tons of near falls before Tanaka finally put Sekimoto away with a barrage of elbow strikes, ala Misawa.
Match Rating: **1/2

Overall: Takashi Sasaki with that nail stub stuck in the back of his head definitely is not for the weak of heart, but give the man credit for getting back in the ring just a weak later! All four matches on this show were definitely fun, and I seriously recommend checking it out.

Labels: BJW

We begin this 2/04/06 edition of Big Japan Death Match Wars with a look at the recent death match push of Saburo Inematsu, who despite looking like your everyday jobber, seems to have found his niche as he worked pretty well against Ryuji Ito & Takashi Sasaki in a light tube death match on the last show, and it took the combined efforts of both Sasaki and Ito to take him down after a spirited fight. Tonight he takes another step into the death match environment as he faces the resident psycho of BJW, Jaki Numazawa in a Fans Bring The Weapons Death Match!

Daisuke Sekimoto & MEN'S Teioh VS Katsumasa Inoue & Hyoma
You could just imagine how stiff those elbow shots Sekimoto & Inoue must have been throwing at each other when you can hear each and every thud when they connect! Interesting to see Sekimoto as the tough, no selling grumpy senior in this one, when a few month’s later he’s going to get the same treatment when he starts working in Zero-One MAX. We didn’t get to see a lot of Hyoma in this one, as it was mostly about the growth of Inoue as he showed he could hold his own against the seniors of the company. He scored several near falls on Sekimoto before getting doubled teamed by both Sekimoto & Teioh, leading to Sekimoto ending the match with his trademark dead-lift German suplex-hold.
Match Rating: *1/2

Daikokubo Benkei VS Yuichi Taniguchi
The commentary team got a good laugh out of Taniguchi when he came out using the old Hardy Boys theme! Benkei & Taniguchi usually team together a lot, but they’ve also developed a bit of a rivalry. The match was clipped down a bit, most probably because big Benkei moves so slow. But what they did show looked fun, as the match sort of became a handicap match due to Hyoma running in to help Taniguchi here and there, like breaking the count when Benkei had Taniguchi pinned! They even double suplexed Benkei and did Taniguch’s running corner cross chop move. Benkei was still able to shrug off the double teaming and deliver a big chokeslam to Taniguchi followed by a big splash to win the match.
Not a lot to this one, but you can’t really expect much from an immobile person like Benkei anyway. Taniguchi should be good when he finally gets serious.
Match Rating: *

A quick look back to earlier in the day as Numazawa checks out the plunder being donated by the fans as they arrive. There’s all sorts of stuff being placed in the dumpster, from a bag of thumbtacks to a devil mask! This one should be fun.

Fans Bring the Weapons Death Match: “Kokutenshi” Jaki Numazawa VS Saburo Inematsu
Numazawa comes out wearing a new leatherface type mask as he torments the crowd in attendance, chasing them around with his chainsaw. Inematsu attacks Numazawa before the bell and continually knocks down the Black Angel before grinding his head with a mini-baseball bat lined with thumbtacks! They brawl out to the floor and Numazawa takes over, breaking a drawer over Inematsu’s head and smacking his back with a shovel! Numazawa than puts the devil mask on Inematsu’s face and spits snack foods at him! Numazawa finds a Freddy Krueger claw in the weapon’s dumpster and tries to carve Inematsu’s face with it, but gives up when he realizes it’s plastic! Numazawa continues by breaking a loaf of French bread on Inematsu’s head, followed by swatting him with a fly swatter. Inematsu mounts a come back, and Numazawa tries to use a Mickey Mouse doll as a shield! Inematsu hits him with a toilet plunger, and Numazawa tries to fight back with anything he can get his hands on.
Numazawa grabs a folding chair from under the ring and breaks it over Inematsu’s head, and then tries to choke him with a dog chain. He than whacks him on the head with a frying pan, before leaving it there and hitting it with the dog chain several times. He gives him one last hit with the frying pan which lets out a big “gong” sound that gets the crowd laughing. Numazawa grabs a big thumbtack lined baseball bat and tries to take a swing at Inematsu, but Inematsu knocks it out of his hand with the frying pan, and smacks the pan over his head a few times! I’m kind of surprised the two are bleeding more by this point.
Inematsu mounts his comeback with some actual wrestling moves, hitting a side Russian leg sweep followed by a big knee drop for a 2 count. He tries to backdrop him on a Tamiya model kit, but misses it. Numazawa fights back hitting a triple-jump dropkick out of the corner, followed by a modified suplex and a short powerbomb for a 2 count. Numazawa places a mini-CD player on him and goes up top, but Inematsu recovers in time, tossing it in Numazawa’s face before giving him a superplex off the top, but Numazawa gets up laughing! They block each other’s lariat attempts, and Numazawa hits a DDT and goes to grab the bucket of thumbtacks!
Numazawa pours the tacks into a pile in the center of the ring, and tries to fireman’s carry Inematsu onto them, but the fights out of it and tries to Rock Bottom Numazawa on them instead! Numazawa breaks free and they both give each other low kicks before Inematsu delivers the Rock Bottom on the pile of tacks! Numazawa gets to his feet and Inematsu floors him with a running double sledge for a 2 count. He gives him a death valley driver on the tacks for another near fall. Inematsu with an enzuguiri and another double sledge for a near fall. Inematsu goes for another running sledge, but Numazawa hits him with a dropkick, himself falling on the tacks again!
Numazawa sets up Inematsu on the top and hits a frankensteiner, Inematsu landing just short of the tacks. Numazawa tries to slam him on the tacks, but Inematsu counters with a small package followed by a double sledge for a pair of near falls. There are tacks all over Numazawa’s body as they trade elbow strikes. The two lunatics are laughing and smiling as they go toe-to-toe, and Numazawa picks up Inematsu and death valley drives him on the tacks for a near fall! Numazawa slams him and uses the frying pan to gather up the tacks and pour them all over Inematsu. He gives him one more whack in the head with the pan before going up top and hitting a big senton roll onto Inematsu’s tack covered body to win the match!
Not as bloody a match as I expected, but the brutality was definitely there thanks to the thumbtacks. Fun match overall.
Match Rating: **1/2

Show ends with Numazawa meeting Inematsu backstage, giving him props and a rematch if he ever wants it.

Labels: BJW

The second half of the big 1/27/06 new year’s show.
Show kicks off with a look back at the formation of Mammoth Sasaki & Shadow WX as a tag team and the road they traveled to get a tag title shot tonight from Abdullah Kobayashi & Daisuke Sekimoto.

Daikokubo Benkei & GENTARO VS Yuichi Taniguchi & Hyoma
Benkei might be the only wrestler in Japan with less mobility than Mr. Pogo or Tadao Yasuda, but he fits in well to these little comedy matches and actually gets motivated to do little sprints every now and then. His on going rivalry with Taniguchi has lead some fun moments thanks to Taniguchi’s unique comedy style. Though it wouldn’t hurt if Taniguchi went serious for a change as he does have some skills when needed and he does have an amateur wrestling background.
Hyoma & GENTARO added some flash to the match thanks to their mix of aerial and ground skills. Thankfully Hyoma will indeed be getting a push down the line, and I can’t wait to see what he can do in a death match environment.
Match Rating: 1/2*

MEN’S Teioh & Onryo VS Yuko Miyamoto & Shinobu
Onryo’s 666 boys gets some TV exposure thanks to his friendship with Teioh. Miyamoto & Shinobu had a good showing despite getting mostly dominated by the senior veteran team. Shinobu did manage to hit the Sex Bomber and S.E.X, but always came up short with the cover. One thing that didn’t make sense though was why Shinobu turned his attention to the referee when Onryo caught the referee’s hand to break the 3 count (like what Yoshinari Ogawa likes to do), and continued to argue with him when Onryo was getting back up to his feet right in front of him while still holding the referee’s hand!
The double Onryo Driver / Miracle Extacy finisher by Onryo & Teioh for the double pin was a great visual and fun end to the match though. The 666 boys are scheduled to make more appearances in BJW in the coming weeks, so it’ll be good working experience and exposure for them for sure.
Match Rating: *

Big Japan Tag Titles: Muscle & Fat (Daisuke Sekimoto & Abdullah Kobayashi) (C) VS Team Angogata (?) (Mammoth Sasaki & Shadow WX)
I’m guessing this wasn’t contested under Death Match rules since they already had a big death match lined up for the main event, but it was still a solid contest pitting the champions against physically the largest tag team in Big Japan who have been running through the competition in recent months.
The champions started off strong with Kobayashi hitting a big dive through the ropes on to the challengers. Sasaki & WX took control when they brawled out into the audience and they double chokeslammed Sekimoto off the second ring (set up for the spider net death match main) event through a table, and continued pummeling the champions with chairs and bits of table. Kobayashi managed to get the hot tag leading to the closing sprint where they dished out the big moves, especially the heated lariat exchange between Sekimoto & WX. Sekimoto was almost able to deadlift-German WX when Sasaki whacked him in the head with a chair. The closing saw Sekimoto charge in and almost get his head taken off by a hard lariat from WX, who finished him off with a brainbuster to win the titles.
It was the standard Big Japan brawl style tag match with big bumps and a hot finish, but it did seem rather rushed at just 15 minutes. I seriously think they could have done better.
Match Rating: ***

Labels: BJW

Kicks off with a look back to Apache Pro’s 1/15/06 Blue Field show where Takashi Sasaki turned his back on Apache Pro and joined forces with Big Japan, teaming with Ryuji Ito & Daisuke Sekimoto in the main event to defeat Apache Pro head honcho Kintaro Kanemura, Bad Boy Hido and GENTARO in the main event of the show.
The war continues tonight with a huge double-ring scaffold six man tag death match!

Katsumasa Inoue & Asian Cougar VS Hiroyuki Kondo & MASADA
The big selling point of this match was the confrontation between regular tag partners Inoue and Kondo who make up Team Wakagumi. The two of them looked pretty even going back and forth trading some loud thudding headbutts, and a rather funny spot where they both tried to get fisherman’s busters on each other, leading up to both men hitting the move individually. They even managed to kick out of each other’s finishers at one point, but Inoue won out in the end hitting a tombstone piledriver followed by a big diving headbutt for the win.
You take a look at a guy like Asian Cougar and you really wonder why he isn’t signed with a major promotion, or at least make a few appearances in the big leagues based on his talent. The guy is even willing to take it to the extreme doing things like a slingshot senton out of the ring onto his opponent laying under a pile of chairs!
And then there’s MASADA, who I can never give enough praise to as one of the most underrated gaijin workers in Japan, considering I’ve never seen him in any US indies. I would really like to see this kid get a shot in either of the big leagues in Japan as there is definitely more to him than just being a hardcore garbage wrestler, and Big Japan definitely see it too since they bring him back more often than guys like Mad Man Pondo and Necro Butcher.
Overall, an enjoyable match to kick off the show, and no hard feelings shown between Inoue & Kondo despite the outcome.
Match Rating: **

Backstage and the Apache Pro team of Kanemura, Kuroda & Inematsu cutting a promo and promising victory in the main event.
When than see the Big Japan team and Ito & Sasaki argue a bit over the name of the team (Takugi-ken Gundan or Takashi Gundan?) while Numazawa plays with his Pokemon toys. I love this stuff!

Double Ring Spider-net Death Match: Ryuji Ito, Takashi Sasaki & Jaki Numazawa VS Kintaro Kanemura, Tetsuhiro Kuroda & Saburo Inematsu
The set up for this match is that there are 2 rings, one is a regular ring, and the other is lined with a barb-wire spider-net and a scaffold overhead.
This was a fun wild brawl as expected, and that barb-wire spider net sure didn’t last long as all it took was Kuroda & Kanemura tossing Ito off the scaffold and Inematsu super-plexing Numazawa onto it to completely take it down and out. Good to see they were still able to make use of the scaffold set up though, as Kuroda & Kanemura did this fun spot where they jacked up Numazawa and hit his head on the bottom of the scaffold several times, and Ito did an insane plancha off the top of the scaffold down to the floor to take out everyone.
Everyone got to hit their spots in this one by the end of the night, with no one really standing out I would say. Ito hit a crazy springboard Dragon-splash out of the ring, Kanemura did his usual table splash and senton spot, as well as a powerbomb to Ito up on the scaffold, Inematsu seems to be able to generate some good crowd heat when he gets his offense going, same with Kuroda who I still say is very overlooked, even in the indies, Sasaki brought the stiff kicks, and Numazawa became the first person I think to ever use the blood dripping from his head as a mist attack!
A great main event won by the Big Japan team after Ito hit the Dragon Splash on Inematsu.
Match Rating: **1/2

Funny that they end the show with a backstage interview with the winning team, and Ito & Sasaki still haven’t decided on the team name yet while Numazawa is still playing with his Pokemon toys! So how do they decide the name? Leave it up to the fans to vote at the BJW website!
Preview for the next episode shows the Big Japan tag title match between champions Abdullah Kobayashi & Daisuke Sekimoto defending against Shadow WX & Mammoth Sasaki.

Labels: BJW

Big Japan Pro Wrestling's first show of 2006 from Korakuen Hall, featuring the big Daisuke Sekimoto VS Masato Tanaka match and another chapter in the Big Japan/Apache Pro interpromotional war.

1/02/2006 Pt.1
Katsumasa Inoue & Hiroyuki Kondo VS Shadow WX & Mammoth Sasaki
Great match with the Wakagumi next generation team taking on the super-heavyweight veteran team, and they pulled off a really entertaining match up.
Inoue & Kondo continue to impress as a tag team, pulling out some great double team moves like a double-bow & arrow submission as well as a double Wakagumi buster on WX. Once again Inoue showed the fighting spirit of a future star as he took some insane punishment, including a modified con-chair-to which busted his lip open.
WX & Sasaki pulled out some good teamwork themselves, albeit a little sloppy (like the double-enzuguiri they pulled). I thought it was interesting that the team that would be challenging for the tag titles later would let the next gen team get in as much offense as they did. The two of them also seem to be a lot more entertaining when doing fast sprint matches and don’t have to slow things down too much.
The first Big Japan match of 2006 was a good way to kick off the show and got the crowd psyched, as well as further establishing the Wakagumi team as future contenders getting the rub from the current tag title contenders.
Match Rating: **1/2

MEN’S Teioh & Onryo VS GENTARO & Shinobu
These two teams put on a really solid junior heavyweight tag match, with lots of fast paced none-stop action from start to finish, and easily rivaled the junior tag matches from the big league promotions. It was a good showing from 666 workers Onryo & Shinobu too, especially for Shinobu at the end when he pulled out multiple counters to Teioh’s Miracle Ecstasy finisher. I think the only small flaw would have been Teioh’s role as the no selling senior of the match, but it’s not really that big a deal and doesn’t detract from the overall match enjoyment.
Simply put, if you enjoy those TNA X-Division type tag matches, you’ll easily enjoy this one.
Match Rating: ***1/2

No Rope Barb-Wire Tornado 6-Man Tag: Abdullah Kobayashi, Ryuji Ito & Jaki Numazawa VS Takashi Sasaki, Kintaro Kanemura & Bad Boy Hido
The Team No Respect dance is always a ton more fun when more people are involved, so it was really fun watching the entire Apache Pro army come out to do the dance tonight.
I’m guessing the spot at the beginning of the match where the barb-wire ropes snapped when Kanemura was whipped into them and he crashed out to the floor wasn’t part of the original booking. But is seemed like they were able to cover it up with the six-man pile up outside the ring which of course lead to the big brawl into the audience.
While Sasaki & Numazawa were brawling up into the stands, Hido & Kanemura gave Kobayashi a double suplex off the ring apron through a table on the outside. After Sasaki hit a bit running kick on Numazawa, Ito threw a table at him before giving him a splash through the table off the balcony. While Kanemura was brawling with Kobayashi in the ring, Sasaki countered a double-suplex attempt by Ito & Numazawa into a double DDT.
All six men brawl back to the ring with the Apache Pro team in command. Kanemura wrapped Ito in barb-wire as Hido grinds a barb-wire bat into Numazawa’s head.
Ito & Numazawa then get a ladder placed on their head before Kanemura & Sasaki start wailing away on it with chairs. Kobayashi is bleeding like a pig as Hido whacks him with a barb-wire bat. Hido gives Numazawa a piledriver on the ladder as Ito reverses a whip and sends Kanemura into the barb-wire ropes, which almost snap again.
The Big Japan team takes control as Ito goes to work whacking everyone with part of a table. Ito hits a moonsault off a ladder for a near fall. Kobayashi with a German suplex on Sasaki for a near fall. Kobayashi hits a double elbow drop on Hido & Sasaki before Kanemura destroys what’s left of the table board by whacking him over the head with it and gives one stiff ass punch! Kanemura tries for a powerbomb, but it’s countered into a Koba-Driver!
Ito sets up the ladder and Kobayashi goes up and drops a big time elbow drop, but the cover is broken up Hido who goes to town on the Big Japan team with a barb-wire bat. Sasaki charges at Ito, but is dropped on the barb-wire with a stun gun! Ito slams Sasaki and hits him with a barb-wire bat before going up the ladder to try for a Dragon Splash, but gets cut off by Kanemura. Sasaki shoves the ladder down and Ito lands ribs first on the wire.
A pile of chairs are tossed in the center of the ring, and Hido & Kanemura give Kobayashi a double backdrop on them. They then give Ito a superbomb off the ladder onto the chair pile for a near fall. Numazawa blocks a head kick from Sasaki and gives him a death valley driver on the chairs. The Dark Angel goes up the ladder, but is cut off by Sasaki who proceeds to superplex him off the top of the ladder! Sasaki hits a hard lariat for a near fall followed by a buzz-saw head kick and an Emerald Frosion on a barb-wire bat to finally pick up the win!
Great solid match overall, though I wish they could have done more with Numazawa in this one.
Match Rating: ***

1/02/2006 Part 2
Daikokubo Benkei & Hyoma VS Tetsuhiro Kuroda & Yuichi Taniguchi
Match is joined in progress.
Benkei might have less mobility than a brick sitting on the sidewalk, but the big man actually can be entertaining when needed and at least he’s not in the main event picture. He gave a good showing here using his size and power, and the fans were in to him.
I’m still digging on Hyoma and I still want to see more of what this guy can do.
I’ve always loved Kuroda in FMW, and it was fun watching him in action here. He had some good exchanges with Benkei where he took down the big man with his lariat. I’d rather be seeing more of Kuroda in the main event scene over Hido any day of the week.
Taniguchi might be a comedy wrestler now, but I can’t wait to see what he can do when he finally gets serious. The fans are already really into the guy and his “corner running cross chop of doom” move. This kid definitely has a ton of potential and him scoring the win here is a sign of good things to come I hope. Heck, he teams regularly with Benkei, and I honestly wouldn’t mind seeing them challenge for the tag titles.
Match Rating: **

Baka Gaijin 3-Way Match: Mad Man Pondo VS MASADA VS Mad Dog
Pondo actually cuts a promo in Japanese before the match! He says he doesn’t speak Japanese, but he loves death matches!
As the ring announcer names the combatants, Mad Dog brings a huge board into the ring and all 3 men fill it with thumbtacks! This gets a HUGE Baka Gaijin chant from the crowd!
All 3 men do an excellent job at the beginning of avoiding getting dropped on the mini pit of tacks, which the crowd really get into. Pondo then moves the pit of tacks into a corner and sets up 3 chairs, leading to a 3-way Louisiana Bar Fight, shades of the Necro Butcher! Pondo is winning until MASADA & Mad Dog double team him and take him out before going to work on each other with some quick mat grappling. Mad Dog & MASADA move surprisingly well for their size, and Mad Dog does some things I wouldn’t expect from him, like a huge flipping senton off the top on Pondo to the outside!
MASADA & Mad Dog brawl on the outside, and Pondo gets back in the ring and uses the referee to do Undertaker’s Old School, only he flips out of the ring on Mad Dog & MASADA! Back in the ring and Pondo shoots MASADA in the groin with a staple gun! He than staples a piece of paper to MASADA’s forehead! Pondo’s rampage continues as he jabs Mad Dog in the head with a scissors and then carves his head with it! MASADA retaliates and jabs Pondo in the head several times with the scissors!
They than do the obligatory brawl out into the audience and Pondo tries to whack both of them with a fan’s umbrella, but is met with a double superkick instead. MASADA & Mad Dog start brawling as Pondo sets up 2 tables and some chairs at ringside. Mad Dog whacks MASADA with a chair and trades big punches with Pondo back in the ring. Pondo misses a big right hand and Mad Dog picks him up and drops with a death valley driver in the pit of thumbtacks! Mad Dog than sets him up face first in the tacks and drives his face in with a leg drop! Mad Dog tries to just slap Pondo’s face into the tacks, but the veteran moves and he gets a hand full of tacks!
MASADA back in and brawls with Pondo. They go up top and Pondo is looking to superplex MASADA out of the ring onto the tables & chairs he set up earlier. Mad Dog tries to intervene, but gets tossed onto the pit of thumbtacks! MASADA than gives Pondo a super frakensteiner off the top through the tables and chairs! Another big “Baka Gaijin” chant starts up! Mad Dog gives MASADA a big suplex back in the ring, but hurts himself since he still has thumbtacks in his back!
MASADA flips out of a backdrop and hits an inverted atomic drop on Mad Dog. He tries for a tombstone, but Mad Dog reverses it and gives MASADA a tombstone on the thumbtacks for a near fall! Pondo back in and whacks Mad Dog with the stop sign before giving MASADA a flipping senton off the top while MASADA is laying in the pit of tacks with the stop sign on his face! Pondo covers, but Mad Dog breaks the count. Mad Dog whacks Pondo with a chair and goes up top but is crotched by MASADA. MASADA tries to super frankensteiner MD off the top through some chairs, but Pondo whacks him with the stop sign and now both MD & MASADA are crotched on the top rope! Pondo hits MASADA upside down with a chair and sets up the pit of tacks on several chairs. This can’t be good. Pondo than piledrives Mad Dog off the top onto the makeshift platform, and it DOESN’T BREAK! Pondon pins him on the pit to take the win!
Damn, this was better than it had any right to be! And hats off to Australian worker Mad Dog for taking all those sick bumps, and he wasn’t even wearing a shirt!
Match Rating: ****

Daisuke Sekimoto VS Masato Tanaka
These two bulls go right at it, testing each other with big shoulder blocks and a stiff chop/elbow battle. Things heat up as they trade more furious elbow strikes, which Tanaka wins and tries for a lariat, but Sekimoto ducks it and gives Tanaka a hard lariat of his own! Tanaka takes a breather on the outside before getting back in at the 17 count. They lock horns again and put on a good showing of mat grappling which the crowd applauds.
They lock up in a test of strength which the more buff Sekimoto wins. Tanaka reverses an Irish whip into the corner and charges in with a hard elbow and a big release German suplex, now sending Sekimoto out for a breather. They brawl on the apron and Sekimoto gives Tanaka a big suplex on the apron! Tanaka rolls off to the floor and Sekimoto quickly back into the ring, but quickly rebounds the ropes and comes out with a big suicide dive sending Tanaka into the first 4 rows!
They brawl up to the stage and have a chair battle, which Tanaka wins. Tanaka sets up some chairs and suplexes Sekimoto on to them. He sets up more chairs and gives Sekimoto a swinging DDT off a standing chair onto a pile of chairs. They brawl through the audience back to the ring. Tanaka gives Sekimoto a drop toe-hold on a chair, followed by dropkicking the chair in his face! Tanaka gets a near fall and they start trading really hard chops again, which Tanaka again wins.
Tanaka now attacking Sekimoto’s legs. Sekimoto fights to a sitting position, which turns out to be a mistake as Tanaka puts him in a headlock while his legs are also still locked! Sekimoto manages to escape, and Tanaka continues to stomp and pound on him as the Zero-1 ring seconds place a table in the ring. Tanaka sets the table up in the corner and rams Sekimoto face first into it for a near fall. Tanaka tries to whip Sekimoto into the table again, but Sekimoto reverses it and Tanaka puts on the brakes. He charges at Sekimoto, but gets picked off his feet and speared into the table!
Sekimoto whips Tanaka into the corner and charges in, but eats a big elbow and a swinging DDT out of the corner, but to the surprise of everyone he pops right back up and gives Tanaka a big spear! Sekimoto gives Tanaka a big lariat in the corner followed by a big superplex off the top. Sekimoto goes back up top and hits a big frog splash for a near fall. They fight for a brainbuster, and Tanaka wins out dropping Sekimoto on his head. Tanaka hits a big running elbow before both men collide with hard lariats. Sekimoto than lifts up and drops Tanaka with a brainbuster!
Sekimoto off the ropes but runs into a big Dangan Lariat! Tanaka hits another brutal brainbuster but only gets a 2 count! Tanaka goes up top and hits the Superfly Splash, but only gets a ONE count! Sekimoto to his feet now and they trade elbow strikes. Tanaka tries for the roaring elbow, but Sekimoto almost takes his head off with a hard lariat for a near fall! Sekimoto with a beautiful German-suplex hold, but only gets a 2 count!
Sekimoto tries for a lariat, but eats a boot followed by the roaring elbow for a near fall! Sekimoto reverses an Irish whip into the corner, but runs right into a big boot. Tanaka immediately follows with the Diamond Dust to pick up the win!
Great match!
Match Rating: ****

Overall: A ton of fun from Big Japan’s first show of the year. The second half was surprisingly a lot better than the first, with the Baka Gaijin 3-way and Sekimoto/Tanaka being really impressive and a lot better than the actual main event of the show.

Labels: BJW

Hardcore Tag Match: Mad Man Pondo & Jason Ray VS Bad Boy Hido & MASADA
You gotta love Pondo. One minute he’s trying to stab Hido with a switchblade, and the next he’s busting out a la majistral cradle to try and get a flash pin! Pondo & MASADA were easily the guys to watch in this one. Despite his mostly brawling tactics, Pondo really is enjoyable to watch since he knows to play to the crowd, unlike say Hido. It’s good to know Pondo doesn’t rely solely on garbage spots and can actually wrestle when required.
Somebody tell me why I’ve never heard of MASADA on the US indy scene? This kid has a lot of potential seeing how he’s willing to blade and bump like he does (remember the flaming punch a while back?). He took Pondo’s knife to the head, and a sick bump when Pondo hit a flipping senton onto a stop sign on MASADA’s face! This kid is definitely earning his stripes and hopefully one day he gets recognized for his hard work in BJW.
I don’t really get Jason Ray’s homage to Jimmy Snuka gimmick where he puts on a leopard skin bandana. He really didn’t do much here other than missing a moonsault and dropping the fall to MASADA courtesy of a Death Valley Driver.
Hido = Boring. Nuff said.
Match Rating: *1/2

Shadow WX & Mammoth Sasaki VS Kintaro Kanemura & Yuchi Taniguchi
Who would have expected this match to be mostly comedy spots? Sure I was expecting Taniguchi’s unique brand of loud mouthed comedy, but I wasn’t expecting everyone in the match to fool around like they did here. Just when you think they were getting serious, something comedic has to happen thanks to Taniguchi. Bare in mind this is also the semi-final match of the show and not an undercard match!
But like I said, Kanemura, WX & Sasaki all played up the comedy bits themselves, from Kanemura being Taniguchi’s cross-chopping oniisan, to WX working the two-handed butt poke attack and Sasaki playing the big dumb guy! There was even a fun spot where Kanemura put an STF on Sasaki, than WX locked one on Kanemura, and Taniguchi locked one on WX!
There was some good stuff also when they weren’t all playing around. Other than the usual brawl into the audience and ruin the seating arrangements, WX stole Kanemura’s table dive spot when he dove off the top and put Kanemura through a table! Also an interesting spot where Sasaki gave Taniguchi & Kanemura a double backdrop off the top while they superplexed WX!
This was an enjoyable fun match overall, and the closing double brainbuster spot was cool too. Just another match on the road for WX & Mammoth to the tag titles.
Match Rating: **1/2

Backstage the comedy music is playing as we see the tag team champions Abdullah Kobayashi & Daisuke Sekimoto cutting a promo of sorts. Kobayashi says a few things and some of it gets bleeped out before he gives Sekimoto a headbutt and walks off! The ‘Macho Man’ song by the Village People hits and Sekimoto does his muscle pose before following after Kobayashi.

BJW Tag Team Titles – 200 Light Tube Death Match: Abdullah Kobayashi & Daisuke Sekimoto VS MEN’S Teioh & “Kokutenshi” Jaki Numazawa
I loved the way this one started off with Teioh & Numazawa “blending in” to the audience by sitting with them and attacking the tag champions from behind when they came.
The usual fun broken glass brawl in this one. It didn’t take long for the light tubes to be broken all over the place and sometimes it looked like the glass could hit the audience. The challengers dominated early on thanks to their subterfuge attack, and I liked the way Teioh breaks light tubes over his opponents heads with rolling elbow strikes. Teioh even did this unique move where he place Kobayashi & Sekimoto’s legs locked in a figure four around a bundle of light tubes before he sits back pulling on the light tubes and breaking them between the tag champions legs!
The champions were finally able to mount a comeback and they took out Teioh by attacking his leg which had a history of problems if I’m not mistakem, with Kobayashi breaking light tubes on it with a big elbow drop! With Teioh out of commission, it was up to Numazawa to do all he could to win the gold, including breaking a bundle of light tubes on Kobayashi with a flipping senton off the top rope!
Just when it looked like Numazawa had the tag titles in the bag, Sekimoto did his always impressive dead-lift German suplex by lifting Numazawa out of the pinning position and flipping him over! Kobayashi then drops Numazawa on his head with the Koba-Driver, Sekimoto hits a big powerbomb, and Kobayashi finishes off Numazawa by breaking a bundle of light tubes on him with a big diving elbow drop off the top to retain the tag titles.
Really strong match overall, but I guess I expected just a tad bit more like some table spots or something. It gets boring when all they do is break light tubes over each other, even if it’s funny watching Numazawa giggle like a little girl when he does it.
Match Rating: ***

Overall: A good show from start to finish with something for everyone. I was just a tad bit disappointed in the main event as the more I watch these light tube matches, the more redundant the spots seem.

Labels: BJW

Korakuen Hall 8/28/2005 – Part 1

We begin this episode with a press conference from earlier in the week at the Big Japan dojo and the announcement of the 3-way tag death match. We get comments from the 3 teams involved and are then treated with a look at how the BJW tag champions are training for the match. First we see Abdullah Kobayashi pulling a mini-car, with Sekimoto in the driver’s seat, than we see both tag champions pulling the huge BJW equipment truck, all with the comedy music in the background! “Macho Man” by the Village People than starts playing as the tag champs flex and pose for the press! I love this stuff!

Katsumasa Inoue & Hiroyuki Kondo VS Mammoth Sasaki & MIYAWAKI
What I thought would just another standard Team Wakagumi (Inoue & Kondo) tag match turned out to be a really, REALY strong match! Inoue & Kondo continue to show their growth, with Inoue starting off with a really heated elbow strike battle with MIYAWAKI, where he seemed to channel Misawa as he launched a barrage of stiff elbows before slamming MIYAWAKI with a half-hatch suplex. Surprisingly we got to see more of Kondo this time around, and he definitely looked good matching speed with MIYAWAKI and bumping for Sasaki. Kondo even got to show some power for a change when he manage to bodyslam the much bigger Sasaki, and hit a good, if rather hesistant looking, swanton bomb. Surprisingly, Inoue & Kondo even managed to get that cool superplex/piledriver combo on their opponents here, with the huge Sasaki being the guy getting superplexed!
It was good to see Sasaki actually work more here, being the big power guy that both Inoue & Kondo had trouble with. He surprisingly worked well with MIYAWAKI too, as they had some good team work, including a cool neckbreaker-powerbomb combo which almost won the match for them. I was really impressed by MIYAWAKI here actually. He did this cool move where he hit Kondo with a low dropkick while he gave Inoue a Samoan drop!
Like I said at the beginning, this was a really strong back and forth tag match with both teams not holding back. And even better still, it ended in a time limit draw!
Match Rating: ***

3-Way Tag Death Match: Ryuji Ito & Takashi Sasaki VS 045 Junkies (Jaki Numazawa & Jun Kasai) VS Muscle & Fat (Abdullah Kobayashi & Daisuke Sekimoto)
I just watched one of these this morning, and this one was surprisingly better! Maybe because this was when Kasai was still around? Or maybe cause after the initial brawl into the audience bit, everyone worked on all cylinders to make this a really fun broken glass brawl! But I still think it’s rather dangerous to do a broken glass death match when the ring is in such close proximity to the audience.
Ito & Sasaki again worked well despite being ex-rivals, finding all sorts of ways to break light tubes onto their opponents by kicking them, as well as Ito doing his ever impressive Dragon Splash onto light tubes! Sasaki was even able to hit an Emerald Frosion onto light tubes.
In the middle of all this broken glass mayhem, Kasai & Numazawa saw fit to power up by stripping down to their sexy pants! And they had things going their way for a while, hitting a stereo senton bomb/Pearl Harbour splash! But the sexy pants would backfire on them as Ito & Sasaki would stuff light tubes down their pants before breaking them with a chair shot! Broken glass in your skivvies can’t be good!
The tag champions again were heavily targeted by the other teams, but held their own pretty well as they threw out some fun tandem offense, like dual throat jabs and elbow drops. They even did the wild double sky-high slam out of the corner to Ito & Sasaki, who superplexed Numazawa off the top and the 3 of them all crashed onto several bundles of light tubes! The champions even did a good job of watching each other’s back like good tag champions should, especially during the finish when Sekimoto spreared Ito, Kasai & Numazawa off the mat as they tried to stop Kobayashi from doing a diving elbow drop off the top rope!
A really great match overall with six of the best in Big Japan!
Match Rating: ***1/2

Overall: Only two matches on this episode, but both matches rocked Korakuen Hall big time! Highly recommended!

Labels: BJW

10/27/2005

Katsumasa Inoue VS Saburo Inematsu
A good competitive match to kick off the show. Inematsu is an Apache Pro guy who’s currently getting a push as more of a hardcore style worker compared to the mat work he does here. He’s not a bad worker, but I just don’t dig his look as he looks like someone’s uncle rather than a pro-wrestler. Another comparison would be he looks like a smaller version of Bad Boy Hidoh. He looked ok here but nothing really outstanding save for a running double-sledge attack.
Inoue continues to shine and I like seeing him in this singles match environment as he gets to show more. He still needs to work on his moveset, but he’s still young with plenty of chances to pick up and learn new stuff. I’d really like to know how he does those loud thumping head butts though.
Match Rating: *

Hardcore Match: Shadow WX & Mammoth Sasaki VS Bad Boy Hidoh & Jason Ray
Seriously, what is up with Hidoh always attacking and abusing one of the commentators? Did the guy knock up Megumi Kudo or something? I just don’t get the purpose of it. Is it supposed to show what a bad ass Hidoh is for picking on a guy that can’t fight back? That’s one of the reasons right there why I’m not big on Hidoh. Seems like he likes to hype himself too much. He smeared Shadow’s blood over the guy’s face this time, and chased him off with a barb-wire bat after the match. Maybe he’d be a better wrestler if he put as much effort into his ring work?!?
US indy worker Jason Ray really didn’t do anything special here, other than putting on a leopard print bandana and emulating a Jimmy Snuka chop followed by a Jake Roberts DDT, which was acknowledged by the commentary team. He ended up dropping the fall to a nasty Shadow WX brainbuster.
WX & Sasaki continue to work well together it seems as they build to their tag title challenge, but wasn’t really much of note here. I really would like to see Sasaki do his airplane spin into a powerbomb finisher he used to do back in FMW though.
Match Rating: *

Backstage for comments from Ryuji Ito & Takashi Sasaki regarding the 3-way tag main event. Both of them seem ready and confident.
Next up it’s Kobayashi & Sekimoto at the announcers table from earlier in the day, complete with comedy music! Sekimoto asks Kobayashi about the main event tonight, Kobayashi replies something that gets Sekimoto laughing, Kobayashi walks off and Sekimoto does his muscle pose before leaving the announce table.
Backstage again and Dark Angel Numazawa introduces us to his new partner replacing Jun Kasai: MEN’S Teioh! Teioh tries imitating Kasai, and the segment ends with both men laughing like psychotic killers!

3-Way Tag Death Match: Ryuji Ito & Takashi Sasaki VS Abdullah Kobayashi & Daisuke Sekimoto VS MEN’S Teioh & Jaki Numazawa
Two sections of the ring ropes are lined up with light tubes, and Kobayashi & Sekimoto’s tag titles are not on the line here.
I’m guessing Teioh hasn’t done a death match in a while since he was the only guy in the match still wearing a shirt. But Teioh was easily the MVP of the match as he gave the standout performance here. You even forget that he’s teaming with Numazawa since I’m used to seeing Numazawa with Jun Kasai. Teioh had this cool variation of the VanDaminator where he tossed light tubes at his opponents, followed by a roaring elbow smash! He even did a rolling cradle to Ito on the ring mat covered in broken glass, and one of the coolest spots of the match was when he did a Miracle Ecstasy chokeslam to Ito onto Sekimoto with a batch of light tubes between them!
Kobayashi & Sekimoto seemed to have a big bulls eye on them since they were the tag champions, even if their titles weren’t on the line here. Sekimoto did this cool spot where he used his strength to dead lift Teioh out of a pin into a German suplex! The biggest spot of the night I guess would have to be when Kobayashi & Sekimoto did a double sky-high chokeslam to Ito & Sasaki, who double super-plexed Numazawa off the top at the same time!
There wasn’t much from Ito and Sasaki here, even if Ito did do some mad Dragon Splashes and Sasaki has a tendency to kick light tubes into his opponents. For the most part it just seemed like they were there to fill in the gaps I guess.
Numazawa was the bump machine as usual, but he worked well with Teioh, and in fitting tribute to his good friend Jun Kasai, scored the win for his team with a Pearl Harbour senton splash, complete with goggles, onto Sekimoto with a batch of light tubes on him!
This was a fun match overall, and really a tribute to Jun Kasai who is currently out of action due to an intestinal infection.
Match Rating: ***1/2

Post match, again in tribute to Kasai, Numazawa & Teioh strip down to their sexy pants!

Overall: Great main event to an ok show.

Labels: BJW

Korakuen Hall 10/14/2005

MIYAWAKI & Yuichi Taniguchi VS Katsumasa Inoue & Hiroyuki Kondo
Now this was a surprisingly good booked match. It was one of those matches where the time went by, and you didn’t notice it! Didn’t hurt that both teams worked well here, and this is probably the best I’ve ever seen of MIYAWAKI in a long time. Taniguchi even kept the comedy down to show some great mat wrestling as well as team work with MIYAWAKI. Taniguchi also did a rare show of strength as he gave both Inoue & Kondo a northern lights suplex at the SAME TIME, and was able to hold them down for a near fall! I also find it interesting that Kondo played the stronger half for his team for a change, but Inoue still looked like the more skilled of the two. An Inoue VS MIYAWAKI tag match would definitely be interesting if it ever came about. Another fun note about this match was that it ended 8 SECONDS short of the time limit!
Match Rating: **

Backstage interview with Kasai & Numazawa who are confident in winning the tag titles tonight. The champions are shown next shaking up some protein shakes (complete with comedy music!). Sekimoto says something along the lines of champions drink protein shakes for strength, but Kobayashi is shaking a coke which spills everywhere since he shook up the bottle before opening it! They toast and drink, and were on to the main event!

Big Japan Tag Titles – 250 Light Tube Death Match: 045 Junkies (“Kokutenshi” Jaki Numazawa & Jun Kasai) VS Muscle & Heart (Daisuke Sekimoto & Abdullah Kobayashi)
This was the first time I ever saw a death match where the audience literally had nowhere to run to avoid debris from the ring! The fans were literally hit by broken glass here every time someone got whipped into the light tubes lining the ring ropes! Maybe they should have given the fans in the first few rows complimentary goggles for eye protection?!?
The match itself was all the usual insanity you’d expect from the 045 Junkies. And it still surprises me the crazy things these guys are willing to put their bodies through despite the ring mat being covered with broken glass. Kobayashi took it a step further this time when he “powered up” by taking his pants off and finishing the bout wearing a sumo mowashi! Sure I’ve seen Dansyoku Dino take his pants off in DDT before, but have you ever seen a guy in a thong towel do a piledriver on broken glass?!? Or anything that requires you to land on your ass while there’s broken glass everywhere?!?
Sekimoto once again showed a lot of heart here, despite his limited move set which I seem to bring up in every Big Japan review I do. But like I always say, he does the best with what he’s got, and still has one of the best German suplexes I’ve ever seen thanks to his brute strength.
Match Rating: ***1/2

Post match, Kasai & Numazawa both strip off their pants and Kasai challenges Kobayashi to a “Sexy Pants For Sexy Pants” Death Match for their next Korakuen Hall show! Unfortunately the match would never come about since Kasai would be diagnosed with an intestinal infection and would be out of action from here on out. Get well soon Crazy Monkey!

Labels: BJW

Big Japan’s big year end Yokohama show. Kicks off with a video package highlighting the main event as Abdullah Kobayashi will challenge Ryuji Ito for the Big Japan Death Match Title.

Katsumasa Inoue & Hiroyuki Kondo VS Hyoma & MIYAWAKI
Pretty obvious that even though both Inoue & Kondo are being pushed as the future stars of the company, but Inoue is getting the bigger push and looks to be deserving it since he shows more skill and personality, knowing how to play to the crowd. Joined in progress but still looked pretty good if not a little one sided at times. I still think Hyoma deserves a bigger push rather than just being the resident job boy of the company despite his great look. There was a really cool double team spot where Inoue gave Hyoma a tiger suplex off the top off Kondo’s shoulders while Kondo gave MIYAWAKI a piledriver at the same time! Great opener for the show overall.
Match Rating: *

Team Apache Pro (Kintaro Kanemura, Tetsuhiro Kuroda, Bad Boy Hido & Subaro Inematsu) VS Team Baka Gaijin (Mad Man Pondo, MASADA, Jason Ray & Mad Dog)
Pondo showed a more fun side to himself as he came out as Mad Man Santa! And he actually distributed gifts like toys and teddy bears to the kids in the crowd!
There was a lot going on in this one to keep up with, but I thought it was a crime to not have Kuroda do next to anything in this one! It’s a travesty that they didn’t give Kuroda something to do in the match other than the Tenchan-Cutter but give some one like Hidoh and even a no name hack like Inematsu more to do. Heck, they build up Inematsu to be a unstoppable superman here as he got his head carved by Pondo’s knife, superbombed by the Baka-Gaijin team, smacked in the head with various weapons, and even had Pondo senton a chair on his head, but still managed to come back and win the match with next to no help! Seriously, I wouldn’t mind if it was Hido who did all that since at least he’s more regular in Big Japan and a bigger name even overall.
Match Rating: **

Scramble Bunk House Death Match: “Kokutenshi” Jaki Numazawa VS Takashi Sasaki
Premise of the Scramble Bunk House Death Match is that there is a shark cage in the ring full of weapons in one corner, with the key hanging on a pole in the other corner to open the cage. Both men start off on the entrance stage and scramble to get to the ring first after a 10 count.
Numazawa doesn’t wait for the 10 count, and immediately tries to take off Sasaki’s head with a CHAINSAW! The match itself was loads of fun as can be expected when you’ve got hardcore maniac Numazawa and the very Tajiri-like Sasaki involved. Sasaki got busted open when Numazawa carved his head with a HACKSAW! Heck, Numzawa even carved Sasaki’s head with a trophy and a seat cushion!
The match also featured two insane spots, one where Numazawa gave Sasaki a hurricanrana off the top of the shark cage onto a ladder (big time OUCH! moment!), and another where Sasaki gave Numzawa a superplex off the shark cage! Numazawa even brought out a HUGE light tube structure (complete with Christmas décor) that was eventually used against him.
Not really as ultra-violent as Numazawa/Kasai or Ito/Sasaki, but still a whole lotta fun to watch.
Match Rating: ***1/2

I guess the whole Inematsu push starts to make sense as he confronts Sasaki after the match, something to do with Sasaki not backing up the Apache Pro team or something. Hey, Saburo, if Sasaki was in that match, you probably wouldn’t be on the card at all, so be thankful you ungrateful SOB.

Shadow WX & Mammoth Sasaki VS MEN’S Teioh & Daisuke Sekimoto
It’s not as if he’s not over enough, but they still continue to shove Sekimoto down our throats every chance they get. In this case they took Teioh out early with a busted knee so Sekimoto had to carry most of the rest of it taking a beating from his super-heavyweight tandem of Shadow and Mammoth. Sekimoto still has one of the best German-suplexes I’ve ever seen, but he can get pretty boring at times as the only other move he has is a lariat.
Sasaki is good at playing the big power monster role, but despite being the business for 6 years now, he still looks rather green and needs to be carried either by his partner or his opponent.
I really would have preferred if they didn’t go with the “Teioh busts his knee, so Sekimoto carries most of the match” route as I really would like to see more of him when he doesn’t have to put his tag partners over. With a bad knee all he could do was cobra-twists and spinning elbow shots. There wasn’t much for Shadow to do either as it was mostly about trying to get Sasaki over.
Match Rating: *1/2

Post match, Sasaki issues a challenge to Sekimoto for his tag titles. Would make more sense if he actually won the match though.

BJW Death Match Title – Scaffold Death Match:
Ryuji Ito © VS Abdullah Kobayashi
You had to know that when your wrestling on a scaffold structure that’s only about 3 feet wide that you’ll be very limited to what you can do. So needless to say they managed to get off the structure rather quickly (by Ito tossing Kobayashi down to the ring!) and most of it thereafter was a bloody in ring war full of broken glass and spilled blood everywhere!
Of course the scaffold played a big factor for some big spots, like Ito doing an insane dive out of the ring to put Kobayashi through a table, Kobayashi giving Ito a dangerous Samoan drop off the scaffold to the ring far below, and a wild Dragon Splash by Ito off the scaffold.
There were also a lot of broken glass due to the excessive use of light tubes, and if you ever doubt the tubes are just gimmick tubes, Ito actually brought out a bundle of them that were actually plugged in and switched on before Kobayashi broke it over his head with a head butt!
Despite all the blood and carnage, they even managed to pull off a few wrestling moves, like a chain of suplexes from Kobayashi, and Ito even doing a northern lights suplex on the scaffold. Overall, I don’t think it was as good as Ito/Sasaki or Numazawa/Kasai from earlier in the year, but still really good and brutal what these guys are willing to put their bodies through.
Match Rating: ****

Overall: Big Japan end the year with a bang as pulled off a great show that sent the fans home really happy, they were even cheering the boss who was doing commentary, and the main event even moved him to tears! The only small complaint I think I would have is if they cut out the Taniguchi tag match with Benkei in it. Still, definately a show worth checking out.

Labels: BJW

Death Match Wars #41
8/14/2005 Part 1
Bad Boy Hidoh, GENTARO & Hyoma VS MEN’S Teioh, Asian Cougar & Zach Gowen
Our favorite one-legged teen wrestler in Big Japan. Yeah, I’m being sarcastic. Zach added a new swinging neck-breaker to his arsenal, but it’s still the same punching bag, two move wrestler from TNA and WWE. Of course, he was the target of the Hidoh led heel team, and he more or less proved that he’s not the best person to give the hot tag too as he was easily taken out. Teioh was still nice enough to give him the pin though.
This is my first time seeing Asian Cougar in action, and he looked good. He did this awesome apron to floor senton onto two chairs placed on GENTARO. Personally, I think he would make a good team with Hyoma as they look almost similar. Hidoh and Teioh didn’t really do much in this one, but for some reason Hidoh took it upon himself to attack the commentary team. Of course it didn’t help that the guy was laughing while Hidoh was strangling him.
Match Rating: *

Light Tube Death Match: Daisuke Sekimoto VS “Kokutenshi” Jaki Numazawa
Numazawa is out to avenge a loss to Sekimoto from a previous encounter, and if your expecting blood, they got it by the pint here! But what more could you expect when light tubes are involved? How about Numazawa going all Mr. Pogo on Sekimoto with a sickle? Numazawa did an innovative camel clutch, but instead of the chin lock, he pulled back on a sickle across Sekimoto’s forehead! He even brought out an old New Jack favorite and carved Sekimoto’s head with a cheese grater! And when broken glass and weapons aren’t enough, how about throwing in a couple a thousand thumbtacks?!!
Of course Sekimoto wasn’t all fodder here for our favorite death match psychopath. He got some good offense in, being the fan favorite and all, but it just seemed to me like he didn’t fit into the death match environment. Sure he bled and bumped like a trooper, but the guy still needs some work. He dominated with his power early on, and tossed Numazawa like a ragdoll. But I thought he wasted a prop when he placed a HUGE light tube crucifix across Numazawa and broke it in half with a simple lariat.
Numazawa has had better death matches, but this was still entertaining and a good setup for Numazawa/Kasai VS Kobayashi/Sekimoto later down the line. You gotta love the way Numazawa starts his after match promo by breathing heavily and slowly turning into his maniacal laugh.
Match Rating: ***

Death Match Wars #42
8/14/2005 Part 2
We start off this episode at the Big Japan dojo (complete with a stack of light tubes at the door!) where a press conference with our favorite blood letting freaks Jaki Numazawa (in a smart suit) and Jun Kasai (dressed only in his Fila underwear!?!), and it’s announced that Kasai will go one-on-one with gaijin ace Mad Man Pondo. Have no idea what they were saying, but they actually bleeped out some of the things Kasai said!

Daikokubo Benkei & Yuki Ishikawa VS Yuichi Taniguchi & Katsumasa Inoue
Inoue reminds me of Tomoaki Honma and is really growing on me. He has some good exchanges with Ishikawa and definitely took it as a learning experience from the UWFi / Pancrase veteran. It will definitely be interesting to see how Inoue develops in the years to come. He already has that Ryuji Ito look of determination to him, and just needs to work on his mat skills and he’ll definitely be a contender in the future.
Taniguchi did his usual routine of unique comedy. Interesting to see him up against Benkei since the two usually team together, but they played off each other really well. Benkei isn’t that bad in the ring either, he’s just slow moving with signs of knee troubles from a long career in the business.
Fun match, and I like the funny promo after the match where Taniguchi bad mouthed Ishikawa only to get chased off in the parking lot!
Match Rating: *

Abdullah Kobayashi & Shadow WX VS “Mr. Insanity” JC Bailey & 2 Tuff Tony
This was cut down a lot, and mostly focused on Kobayashi beating down Tony. They went all the way out to the concession stand where Kobayashi stuffed a kebab in Tony’s mouth before giving him a diving elbow drop off the concession table! Other than that was all brawling, and Kobayashi kicking out of the Tony Driver (Axe Guillotine Driver), and the gaijins screwed the home team out of the win when Tony pinned Kobayashi with a powerbomb out of the corner and putting his feet high on the ropes for leverage. WX instantly attacked the ref for making the 3-count when he could obviously see what Tony was doing.
Match Rating: ½*

Ryuji Ito & Takashi Sasaki VS Mammoth Sasaki & MASADA
Damn! I was about to write this up as just another tag match, but then things got really INSANE! First it was the usual brawl out into the crowd where Ito locked Mammoth in a tarantula on an erected scaffolding! Back to the ring for more brawling, and then MASADA does something crazy I’ve never seen before: he set his bare hand on FIRE to deliver a big punch to Sasaki! From there MASADA wheeled over the huge scaffolding structure and looked to dive out on Sasaki from the top, but Ito made the save and launched MASADA off the scaffold through a stack of chairs in the ring! Ito than followed up with a HUGE Dragon Splash off the scaffold for the win! Definitely a surprise considering everything else on the show so far!
Match Rating: **1/2

Mad Man Pondo VS Jun Kasai
Man, Kasai still has a lot of sick welts on his back from the razor board match with Numazawa from awhile back. I was also wondering where Numazawa was since Pondo has 2 Tuff Tony in his corner and he constantly helped Pondo to cheat.
Starts off with the usual brawling out into the crowd and such, and Pondo dominated most of the match thanks to Tony’s help. Kasai bled big time thanks to Pondo carving his head with a pocket knife, but things got really interesting when he finally was able to bounce back. Probably the sickest spot of the match was Pondo giving Kasai a piledriver off the second rope through a burning table! Kasai retaliated giving Pondo a diving chair to the head with a chair that was set on fire!
This match was ok, it’s just too bad we had to wait till the end for the good stuff to come out.
Match Rating: **

Overall: What? No Necro Butcher? What the heck. Good shows overall, with the must see stuff being Numazawa/Sekimoto and the Ito/Sasaki VS Mammoth/MASADA tag match. Don’t expect too much though.

Labels: BJW

This show continues from #47 where Kobayashi & Ito faced Numazawa & Kasai in the Fire Death Match main event.

Katsumasa Inoue & Masa Takanashi VS Daichi Kakimoto & Kota Iifushi
Three of DDT’s top rookies in a match here with BJW’s top rookie (Inoue). I like that DDT gives it’s rookies gimmicks or at least a distinguishing look off the bat so that they at least have a personality. These four guys put on an entertaining match here, with Kota & Kakimoto showing a lot of potential. And I loved the SWEET Dead-End style Dragon Suplex move or Kakimoto!
Inoue has a strong following in BJW with his regular tag partner, Hiroyuki Kondo, but I feel the guy still needs to add to his move set before he can actually stand out from the rest of the pack.
Match Rating: *

Hardcore Tag Match: MEN'S Teioh & Daisuke Sekimoto VS Shadow WX & MASADA
This one started off with the usual brawling out into the crowd, which I’m really not big on cause the camera can never catch up with the workers. I don’t even know how Sekimoto got busted open. This wasn’t really much of a hardcore match, other than there being no disqualifications for using a chair, it was mostly a standard tag match. But the ending sprint was pretty good though. MASADA is a big gaijin, but really didn’t do much of note here. WX used to be one of the best, but I guess his age is catching up him as he was rather stiff and didn’t do anything special I would say other than the senior role.
Teioh looked pretty good, delivering some good rolling elbows even if they did look a little weak. It was fun watching him hit the Miracle Ecstasy chokeslam on MASADA though. Sekimoto was all about the power game. I think the best spot in the match was when he lifted MASADA’s dead weight off the mat and gave him an awesome delayed German suplex.
Match Rating: *1/2

Hardcore Match: Mad Man Pondo VS Necro Butcher
These two American maniacs put on another bloody battle. I really mark out for Necro Butcher’s West Virginia Bar Fight, where he sits two chairs in the ring, than the two of them sit there and trade STIFF punches! First to drop loses, and Necro almost always comes out on top of these!
Necro also did one nasty blade job, where you could actually see the gash in his head, and it even freaked out the announce team! It also didn’t help Necro that Pondo started carving away at it with his knife! Necro would get a measure of revenge for this when he would rip open a beer can and carve Pondo’s head with it!
And what Baka Gaijin match would be complete without some sick spots? I think Necro hurt his hand punching the stop sign away from Pondo. Necro also gave Pondo a super Frankensteiner off the top through several chairs, and Pondo gave Necro a sick suplex onto the steel steps!
A good match, but I know they can do better (maybe sicker), which is probably why they requested a death match during the after match interview. I’d love to see what they could do with barb-wire and broken glass myself.
Match Rating: **1/2

Labels: BJW

We start off this episode in a parking lot somewhere in Japan, aka the open-air venue for today’s show. The main event is a Fire Death Match, and we have interviews with the participants. Team No.1, Jun “Crazy Monkey” Kasai and Jaki “I’m Crazier Than Kasai” Numazawa. We than go to Team No.2, Abdullah Kobayashi & Ryuji Ito. As they give their comments, Kasai & Numazawa show up and try to run them over in a mini-car! The two maniacs get out and Kasai says he’s going to demonstrate the fire bit of the match they are in tonight. He lights a board on fire and takes a swing at Kobayashi and the flaming towel wrapped around the board comes off and hits Kobayashi in the face! I think there was a SNAFU here, but the two crazies get back in their mini-car and insult Kobayashi some more before driving off laughing like the maniacs they are!
Back to our heroes, and cue the COMEDY music as Kobayashi is okay and they get some last comments in before the opening credits start.

Daikokubo Benkei & Yuichi Taniguchi VS Futoshi Miwa & Hyoma
DDT’s Futoshi Miwa was wearing this horrible green egg suit reminiscent of Akebono!
The match itself was loads of fun and filled with comedy (both intentional and unintentional), and even Benkei had a hard time keeping a straight face! There was a big pop for Benkei VS Miwa, the two super-heavies in the match, it’s just too bad they didn’t have more time in the ring together. Taniguchi did his usual loud mouth comedy stuff, which the crowd easily got into.
I really like Hyoma’s rocker gimmick, and he’s a pretty good junior heavyweight too, it’s just too bad he’s usually regulated to being the fall guy in matches. I think Taniguchi is even higher on the Big Japan food chain than him which is a shame cause I’d really like to see what he can do in a big match environment.
Very entertaining match overall.
Match Rating: **

Back to earlier in the day for more comments about the upcoming death match from the participants. We got the comedy music going for Kobayashi again, and he seems to get it lot for what I’ve seen.

Fire Tag Death Match: Ryuji Ito & Abdullah Kobayashi VS Jun Kasai & “Kokutenshi” Jaki Numazawa
We’ve got a ring with barb-wire ropes which also have pads on them that are to be set on fire for the match, as well as barb wire board and light tube around the ring area. Yup, we definitely are in for a good time with this one! There really aren’t any rules to this one, only that after about 5 minutes, the ropes will be set on fire.
Kasai & Numazawa come out to “Wait and Bleed” by Slipknot, which instantly scores them even more coolness points with me as it totally matches their insane tandem. And needless to say the match was dangerous, not just for the wrestlers, but for the audience as well when we got a maniac like Numazawa running around ring side swinging a flaming 2X4!
The match starts off with a whole lot of brawling into the crowd that the cameras can’t even catch up with the action. Even one of the commentators got heckled by Numazawa who spat water in his face.
Kobayashi was dubbed “King of the Fire Match” going into this due to his past experience, and he ended up taking a lot of punishment from the his opponents. Their in ring mobility was severely limited once the ropes were set on fire, but they once again showed a lot of innovation. Like one really sick spot where Kobayashi drove Numazawa through a roll of light tubes onto a flaming chair with a Axe Guillotine Driver! I also wondered how Ito and Kasai would pull off their finishers since there were no corner pads, so they brought out a ladder and Ito hit a huge Dragon-Splash out over the flames to put Kasai through a table!
The fire didn’t play along for some of the spots though, since some of the props wouldn’t stay lit for too long before the wind blew them out, but they still managed to pull off a great main event for this show and the crowd was wild for the whole thing.
Match Rating: ***1/2

After the match, Kobayashi challenges Kasai & Numazawa to one more tag match at the upcoming Korakuen Hall show with his regular tag partner, Daisuke Sekimoto. I might not be the best Jap speaker around, but I definitely understood Numazawa say he would KILL Kobayashi at Korakuen, before laughing like the maniac he is.

Overall: Two fun matches on a one hour TV slot makes this a show definitely worth checking out. And it’s no secret right now I’m pretty much a mark for that maniac Numazawa!

Labels: BJW

Welcome to a very special Puroresu review! In addition to my usual views of the match, I’ve added comments from my lovely significant other, Trish! She’s no stranger to watching wrestling, but this is her first time watching Japanese death matches!

Big Japan Death Match Wars #35
6/8/2005 pt.1
MEN'S Teioh & MASADA VS Daikokubo Benkei & Abdullah Kobayashi
That’s funny, I don’t remember MASADA being a gaijin??? This match was clipped a bit, but was surprisingly fun. Kobayashi did most of the work for his team, but Benkei was actually entertaining for the bits he was in the ring and the crowd loved him for actually attempting a suicide dive! Not really a lot from this one, but what was shown was passable.
Match Rating: *
Trish’s comment: How old is that bald guy in the coveralls?

BJW Death Match Title - 300 Light Tube Death Match: Ryuji Ito VS Takashi Sasaki
This was one of the most BRUTAL death matches I’ve ever seen! You had 300 light tubes surrounding the ring ropes and lining the ring mat, and they just about used ALL of them including the home made toys they brought with them! Just seconds into the match and already they are bleeding from having light tubes smashed over each other’s heads, and of course there was broken glass all over the ring as a result of it making even the simplest move hurt more as well as both guys taking damage from doing the most basic moves like dropkicks and suplexes, but that didn’t stop them from doing them anyway! They just went at it with no concern for their own well being, and you could see the results from all the cuts and how bloody their backs and arms were!
You got to have a high level of respect for these guys to do what they were doing here, suplexes, brainbusters, splashes and powerbombs all on broken glass! You really cringe at some of the things they were willing to put their bodies through to have an incredible match. I truly believe all the hype behind Ryuji Ito now, and give Sasaki a lot of credit as well as both men put on a fantastic contest that wasn’t just a spotfest. Even if it wasn’t a death match environment, these two have the talent to pull out an awesome contest. It truly deserves the rating I give these two for the match.
Match Rating: *****!!!
Trish’s comment: These two guys are crazy! Eric, if you ever get involved in pro wrestling, you better NOT take part in anything that involves light tubes and broken glass!

Big Japan Death Match Wars #36
6/8/2005 pt.2
Hadcore Match: Daisuke Sekimoto & Kintaro Kanemura VS Bad Boy Hido & GENTARO
The story of this match was Sekimoto trying to avenge a loss over Hido from one of the previous shows. Sekimoto is jacked, like a Japanese Brock Lesner, but I noticed it hinders his mobility. The mass really helps when he’s throwing STIFF lariats though! He also has a good rolling German as well as a slow high angle German. He even did this really cool spot where he lifted GENTARO in a torture rack with a ladder! Sekimoto is a little green, but is being pushed as the future of the company, and I can definitely see him there in a few years having great matches with Ryuji Ito.
Kanemura has lost some serious weight since the last time I saw him. It’s good to see him working full speed and injury free for a change. The man can definitely still go and has a lot of good years left in him.
I haven’t seen much of GENTARO, but much like his AkaRangers tag partner, Takashi Sasaki, he showed a lot of potential here! The guy would make a great addition to any promotion’s junior heavyweight division. He’s a great high flyer and even had the balls to do a balcony dive to put Sekimoto through a table! He also did a sweet Van Terminator to Kanemura who was hung upside down on a ladder!
Hido sucks. That’s probably the reason why they made this a tag match instead of a singles match. The guy didn’t really do anything, and even his Hido-chan Bomber lariat is lame. Hido sucks.
Overall, the match was entertaining with the crowd heavily behind Sekimoto and GENTARO did an ace job of carrying the work load for his team.
Match Rating: *1/2
Trish’s comment: Sekimoto’s got a lot of muscle, but he can hardly move because of the mass. I don’t get the lame dance Kanemura did in his intro. GENTARO is nuts for jumping off a balcony. Hido sucks and didn’t deserve the win.

Madness of Massacre Death Match: “Kokusenshi” Jaki Numazawa VS Jun Kasai
A little Chainsaw Charlie action from Numazawa as he comes out with a chainsaw and causes havoc in the audience on his way to the ring! I love Numazawa’s gothic Dark Angel look. Kasai comes out with a little toy of his own: a board of RAZORS attached to a crucifix! Bare in mind these two are best friends (they even started off the match with a big KISS in the centre of the ring!), but they tried to KILL each other here!
The match started off really slow with Numazawa selling a hurt back after Kasai splashed him through a table, but then business really picked up after Numazawa powerbombed Kasai on the razor board! You could instantly see a whole lot of cuts on his back and the match became a blood bath from there! Numazawa just went psycho and even covered the ring with a bucket of THUMBTACKS! And we’re barely halfway through the match! What follows are a whole lot of sick and bloody spots which are definitely not for the weak of heart. For example, Numazawa stuffing tacks into Kasai’s mouth before slapping them out! And of course every move they did after hurt both of them since the ring mat was littered in tacks, but they didn’t seem to care! Can you even imagine what it’s like to do a German suplex-hold and a frog splash onto thumbtacks?!? I just watched the CZW Tournament of Death a few weeks ago, but even this was a new level of SICK!
After the match, they had a fun in ring interview where Kasai said something that actually got bleeped out, and than the fans started chanting it, so we got a chant of bleeps! You gotta give the Crazy Monkey credit for leaving normal wrestling in Zero-1 and actually coming back to do this death match madness.
Match Rating: ****1/4
Trish’s comment: These two guys are even more insane than the other two! Eric, you better stay away from razor boards and thumbtacks as well!

Big Japan Death Match Wars #37
6/8/2005 pt.3
Katsumasa Inoue & Hiroyuki Kondo VS Hyoma & Hajime Ishikawa
This was actually the opening match of the whole show. Kondo & Inoue are the young lions of the company and work well as a team. Inoue has got this really unique submission hold that’s like a sharpshooter, but he locks the guy’s arms instead!
I really like Hyoma’s punk look. Doesn’t hurt that he’s a decent indy worker as well. His partner Ishikawa is also from the indy scene if I’m not mistaken, and just looked decent.
Not really a lot to the opener, but there was this one cool spot where Kondo and Inoue gave Hyoma a triple decker superplex, while Inoue gave Ishikawa piledriver at the same time!
Match Rating: ½*
Trish’s comment: Boring.

Shadow WX & Yuichi Taniguchi VS Mammoth Sasaki & Tetsuhiro Kuroda
Kuroda was just SUPER-over in this one! Even more than local hero WX it seemed! Rookie Taniguchi did some fun comedy bits which combined with Kuroda’s unmatched charisma and overall overness in the match, made it entertaining at least. I thought it was hilarious the way Taniguchi screamed “Okasan!” (mother) when he got kicked in the balls.
There was one MAJOR f*** up by Sasaki in the match where he swung a chair at Taniguchi and lost his grip on it, and the chair flew into the audience somewhere! Don’t know if the chair hit anyone, but Sasaki did some big apologizing in his interview after the match, which was watchable overall.
Match Rating: *1/4
Trish’s comment: These guys suck. Sasaki needs to lose the jersey and dress like a wrestler.

Baka Gaijin Falls Count Anywhere Street Fight: Mad Man Pondo VS Necro Butcher
I am a HUGE fan of the Necro Butcher! Especially after seeing him in the CZW Tournament of Death 4, and he’s a big reason I’ve decided to check out Big Japan. The guy is a bump machine, much like Mick Foley. I just hope his career isn’t cut short by all the big falls and bumps he takes. The Japanese fans also react well to the guy,
This was a great American style street fight match which had it’s share of sick spots like using a staple gun on each other! They sort of took it a step further when Pondo stapled Butcher’s lip to the turnbuckle! But overall, Butcher made this match by bumping and blading for Pondo big time, taking a slam off the top turnbuckle to the floor, taking a load of unprotected chair shots including Pondo dropping a table on his head, getting tossed off the stage through a pile of chairs, as well as getting his forehead carved by Pondo with a jacknife!
Pondo himself took some bumps, including a sick frankensteiner off the top out of the ring through a pile of tables and chairs! You’d probably find it hard to believe that despite all the carnage they put each other through, the match was won with an actual wrestling move!
I like what Pondo said after the match about how even though they are friends, they are willing to kick each other’s ass for the fans, the yen, the beer and the chicks!
Match Rating: ***
Trish’s comment: These guys look old, and Butcher is crazy for bumping like he does.

Overall: Eventhough this event was separated into three parts, I highly recommend checking it out if you’re a fan of wild and bloody death matches, or are keen to check out something different. It seems I always stumble into something new in Puroresu no matter how long I’ve been following it. And this is just another example of it.

Labels: BJW

Dick Togo, Nobutaka Moribe & Hayate VS Ayako Hamada, AKINO & Chikayo Nagashima
Fun fast paced opener with the all male rudo team took on the joshi face team. Joined in progress with Nagashima taking the brunt of the punishment from the rudos, but once the hot tag was made the fun factor went up several notches as Hamada was the only member on her team that could match size and power with the guys, heck, physically, she was bigger than the three of them! Ayako is former ARSION tag champions with AKINO, and the duo showed they could still work together well despite not tagging together for a while. I really would have liked to have seen more of AKINO in the match too.
You gotta give Togo and the guys credit for bumping and selling for the ladies, like taking a big powerbomb from Ayako as well as a wicked DDT from AKINO, but the girls took it as well as they gave it, especially Ayako who took a great looking double-team complete shot, as well as Togo’s Pedigree and senton bomb!
Great and fun opener overall.
Match Rating: **1/2

Cosplay Death Match: Shoichi Ichimaya VS Sakura Hirota
Basically this was a cosplay contest between puroresu’s two biggest cosplayers. Basic rules were that it’s a 2/3 round contest with the winner of each round to be decided by judges decision based on their cosplay performance.
The first round was the Hustle challenge featuring Shinya Agimoto VS General Sakura Takada!
The second round was Gil Nakano VS Sakura Nakano! Gil was accompanied by Futoshi Miwa as Dump Matsumoto! Check out the nun-chuck action in this one!
And the final round was Agira Hokuto VS Sakura Kandori! Reliving a classic joshi rivalry!
Not really any wrestling involved save for the light skirmish at the end of the third round, but a fun contest to check out.
Match Rating: None
Entertainment Rating:

Dansyoku Dieno VS Aja Kong
You just knew this would be one heck of a comedy match as the two of them were already arguing earlier on during the wrestler introductions at the beginning of the show. I thought I’d seen it all from Aja when she joined Hustle, but I never thought I’d see her do the things she did here with Dieno! She took Dieno’s Dansyoku Driver and even used YinLing’s Masochist Lock! Easily one of the funniest comedy matches I’ve seen in awhile.
Match Rating: *
Entertainment Rating:

Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Mariko Yoshida VS Yuki Ishikawa & Carlos Amano
Honestly, this was the last match I expected to find some comedy gold in, and for BATTLARTS ace Yuki Ishikawa was the last person I expected to see it from since the last time I saw him it was in one hell of a bloody brawl with Ryuji Hijikata in AJPW last year.
The match started off normally with Ishikawa & Fujiwara exchanging heavy hits and submission locks, but once the women tagged in and mixed it up with the men, there were some funny and hilarious moments to be had! Especially from Ishikawa who was as close as you could come to being a downright pervert when he mixed it up with Yoshida! Even old man Fujiwara couldn’t resist planting one on Amano when he had the chance!
Of course it wasn’t all fun and games, as when the women mixed it up, we were given an FANTASTIC display of ground grappling as they showcased a clinic of mat holds, counters and reversals. Heck, when he was serious for a minute, Ishikawa even traded holds with Yoshida on the mat.
This mach would probably pass as entertaining and even though it was funny, I didn’t like the ending, but I guess it was the best way not really drop the fall at the end of it.
Match Rating: *1/2
Entertainment Rating:

Meiko Satomura Return Match: Jinsei Shinzaki & Meiko Satomura VS MEN'S Teioh & Ran Yu-Yu
Satomura is making her return match from a back injury, so naturally the opposing team decided to work over her back throughout the match. Eventhough that strategy would make sense, I wouldn’t really call it a smart booking decision since it might also re-aggravate her back injury which is not good.
The story of the match was basically Satomura getting her back worked over for the most part. I’m not sure if it’s really her gimmick, but she came out dressed in full priest gear like Shinzaki, but her style if more of an explosive submission striker. She took a lot of punishment, but looked good for what offense she got in.
Shinzaki was his usual calm collected self, and was great to watch off the hot tag when he took it to both opponents. I haven’t seen Teioh in a LONG time, but the former Big Japan champion looked good here, showing some ring smarts as well as some good submission work on Satomura’s back. There wasn’t really a lot that notable from Ran Yu-Yu, but she looked good from what I saw.
A good match overall with a great story to it and worked at a good pace. Nothing really outstanding, but nothing much wrong with it either.
Match Rating: *1/2

Barb-Wire Rope, 100,000 Light Tube Death Match: Chigusa Nagayo, Ryuji Ito & Sanshiro Takagi VS Mayumi Ozaki, Shadow WX & Abdullah Kobayashi
Quick rundown on the participants: Shadow WX is one of the original death match innovators from Big Japan Pro Wrestling. He sorta looks like a cross between Satoshi Kojima and Kintaro Kanemura these days. Abdullah Kobayashi is another death match veteran who borrows his gimmick from Abdullah the Butcher, his physique is even almost similar, but he does have a tad bit more wrestling ability. Mayumi Ozaki is a joshi legend, and no stranger to hardcore action, and not just because she once did a lesbian porn movie with Cuty Suzuki before! Of course this whole team all have death match experience under their belts, and their intro was fun as well as the two guys carried Ozaki to the ring like a queen on their shoulders.
On the face side, Ryuji Ito is the current Big Japan champion. A young ace who’s credited with being one of the best death match innovators in modern times, with actual wrestling skills to go with his death match abilities. Sanshiro Takagi is the ace of DDT, and for some wild and bizarre reason, the guy comes out wearing a full Gundam costume, complete with helmet to protect him from the impending carnage! I’ll honestly admit I don’t know much about Nagayo, but she’s a legend in the business forming a long time team with Lioness Asuka.
The match itself is a wild brawl as expected, but it was hard to take it serious for awhile when you have Takagi doing comedy spots in a Gundam suit! Thankfully he does lose the Gundam suit later n the match and gets serious as he reverts to his Stone Cold gear. The whole ring was lined with fluorescent light bulb tubes, in addition to the ones brought by the competitors. So as you can expect, it wasn’t long before there was broken glass everywhere, making a simple move like a dropkick as painful for the guy who delivers it as the guy who receives it! As expected, Nagayo was the main focal point of the match as she took a lot of punishment while her teammates were taken out rather easily and disappeared for most of the match. Everyone bled whether they wanted too or not since there was broken glass all over the ring, and it was rather interesting the things they came up with to break the light tubes over each other. I was a bit disappointed that Ozaki really didn’t do much in the ring, though she did take several light tube shots to the head. A great match to end the show, and if I’m not mistaken, Nagayo’s retirement was announced after the show.
Match Rating: **1/2

Overall: This was truly a fun show overall with a great mix of wrestling action, comedy and death matches! The comedy might out weight the actual wrestling on the show, but I’m not really complaining as it was refreshing to see something different for a change. Hopefully even though she’s retired, Nagayo will continue to book fun little shows like this from time to time.

Labels: BJW, DDT, Joshi