Magnum Opus KAI

What's this? A brand new project on the old blog? Yes it is. Today we are trying something new. Chismo and I are both going to watch a match and rate it separately. That way we can see how our tastes and views differ. Chismo approached me with this idea a while back and I immediately thought it sounded like a fun idea. When he then suggested that we do it with one of my boys, Wrestle-1 star Kai, I got the added idea of making this a series, a chronicle of Kai's descent into madness as he goes from AJPW's golden boy and Mutoh's anointed one, to the self proclaimed ace all the way to his current Onita/Dean Ambrose cosplaying gimmick. Strap in, this is going to be a wacky ride.

Who is Kai? Kai is a Japanese wrestler trained in the Animal Hamaguchi/Keiji Mutoh/All Japan Pro-Wrestling school. Up until 2012 he worked as a junior heavyweight and things were going smoothly, winning the Junior League in August of 2008. Only a few short months after his re-debut post excursion to Mexico. Kai was set up as the future top junior heavyweight of All Japan alongside his training mate Hiroshi Yamato and things were trucking on well for him (for more info on his junior days, please visit his Wikipedia page). But in 2012 he made the announcement that he was going to move up to Heavyweight, and that was seemingly the gunshot that set off all the events that has led to this day in his career. Kai's initial heavyweight run in All Japan started just as strong as his junior run. He slotted into the Champion's Carnival and had a good run in it, which takes us to this match….

This first match in this descent into Kai madness is from his Champion Carnival run. And it is the semi final match of the tournament where he faces off against at the time recent import Go Shiozaki. The winner would face Jun Akiyama in the finals of the tournament. Without further stalling, let's get to it!

Random Perrito Shit from AAA

AAA Rey de Reyes 2012

 (2012/03/18)

4-WAY for 2012 Rey de Reyes: Jack Evans vs. Hector Garza vs. Hijo del Perro Aguayo vs. LA Park

Oh man, what a bad match! One would probably never guess based on talent involved, but the match was truly bad, and it’s all because of AAA being the worst here. We got some solid stuff before the first elimination, which happened after Jeff Jarrett hit LA Park with a guitar. On the entrance stage far away from the ring. With fucking Karen being involved. The guitar wasn’t even smashed. Guitarshot suddenly means a killshot, after three million wrestlers kicking out of it in various places. So now the one and only LA fucking PARK has to lose like some rookie geek to advance a shitty angle? FUCK! YOU! It was all downhill from there. Ringwork blending in with shitty booking, everyone looking bad and lazy, etc. The only somewhat saving grace was Hector repeatedly interfering and messing with referee during Jack Evans’ pin attempts on Perro. That shit was legitimately funny and the only reason why I didn’t DUD this crap. Such a mess, just a vintage AAA clusterfuck.

bad

Don’t You Dare Stare, You Better Move

CMLL 2013/11/22

Rush vs. Negro Casas

This might be the very best under-10 minute match of all time. I’ve never seen this one before, hell, I didn’t even know it existed until accidentally stumbling upon it on YouTube. And bah gawd, it’s all about Rush and 4:40 going HAM at each other in a highly violent and gruesome fashion, holy shit was this scuffle glorious or what? Negro violently charges at Rush early on, realizing it’s one of those “kill or be killed” situations where he mustn’t leave any room for his bitter enemy to breathe, show no mercy because this is a dirty war. But Rush is just way too young and strong for Negro, which means he managed to outpower him, so when he gained control he unleashed a truly rough and barbaric beating on poor Negro. What followed was one of my favorite brawling bits I have ever seen, true story, with Rush just using the 50+ year old as his own personal punchbag, and Negro selling everything like he got hit by a fucking speeding bus. It was borderline uncomfortable. But it was fantastic. This match is a “pure” pro-wrestling brawl, it was short, but they still managed to convey a relatively traditional mini-closing stretch, with dramatic counters and all. Stupendously superb tussle, such a must-see clash that really puts things into perspective when it comes to the wonderful Rush/Casas feud.

*****

Averno/Titan x4

So… I’ve always wanted to give this feud a proper watch, but just kept forgetting, smh. They faced off five times mano a mano, IIRC, and I found four matches and checked them. Can’t find the fifth one, from January 2014. Waddaya gonna do… Now, the right thing to do would be watching two or three prelude trios before every singles match to “get” the whole picture, but as of now I don’t feel like it, mainly due to its time-consuming nature.

Do People Actually Think Park Isn't the Best?!

TXT 2013/5/11

LA Park vs. Dr. Wagner Jr.

Legendary blood brawl of modern lucha. And it gets better on every viewing. The first two falls are perfection, the tercera not so much. It’s still great and stiff, they worked a regular fall, but the ref bumps kind of drag the match down a notch. But no biggie there, because this is still a fantastic piece of pro-wrestling, the first two falls are as good as it gets in the lucha massacre department. Park dominated Wagner for 13 straight minutes, the entire primera and good part of segunda, it was nasty and brutal, Park was one mean motherfucker, his asskicking aura shined like almost never before. He looked and acted frightening. Hard chairshots, mask-ripping, blood licking, brawling through the crowd, punches, kicks… Glorious shit. Wagner was selling everything like death. The crowd was extremely pro-Wagner here, there were numerous “Parka es puto” chants as he was decimating their hero. When Wagner finally made his comeback, the place exploded, Hulkamania style. Obviously Wagner gave Park a taste of his own medicine, as it was his turn to unleash violence now. He fucked up Park pretty bad with a beer bottle, Park was bleeding buckets, to the point they had doctor stopping the match for awhile to patch his forehead. Also, huge props to Black Terry for being such an awesome and easy-going ref, he let them go as hardcore as they wanted. Sweet!

This is an amazing match and a must-see for every lucha fan out there.

****3/4

Rush/Shocker Saga (Cherry-Picked)

CMLL 2013/11/18

Rush vs. Shocker

Demon/Texano x2

AAA Rey de Reyes 2013

(2013/3/17)

Mega Campeonato de AAA: Blue Demon Jr. vs. Texano Jr. ©

I really liked this, but somehow the impression is they could’ve done more. The biggest surprise (and positive) was them working clean as a whistle for the most part, especially in the first half where it was just some old school lucha, full of simple leg hooks and quick reversals/pin attempts. You don’t see that in brawlish AAA often. The match naturally and gradually escalated and we got few awesome chop battles, the dives were also done very well and the big moves were placed properly, the crowd was into everything. However, things were kind of too move-exchanging happy in the closing stretch, also the match could’ve used some more heat after the awesome llaves contra llaves build. So, yeah, those two things prevented the match from being truly awesome, but all in all this was still a neat title match.

***3/4

AAA 2013/3/29

Blue Demon Jr. vs. Texano Jr.

Similar to the RDR match, only with the mat game cut off, which made for a fast sprint, this was another very quality match between these two. Big moves were executed well once again and the climax was more tight and coherent than in RDR.

***3/4

NJPW on AXS TV: Episode 8

New Japan Pro-Wrestling on AXS TV

Episode 8, March 6th 2015

King of Pro-Wrestling 2013

(2013/10/14)

NEVER Openweight Championship & Tokyo Dome Heavyweight Title Shot: Yujiro Takahashi vs. Tetsuya Naito © (G1w)

Man, oh man, this was such a letdown. These two guys are former tag team partners with lots of bad blood in between them, not just they are rivals but storyline wise Yujiro also injured Naito’s leg and put him out of action for a long while. But still, this match was totally heatless and colorless. They did try something with the chairs but it was so lukewarm. Yujiro did work over Naito’s leg but they dropped that plot point quickly. Basically they wrestled a regular match that looked completely out of place for this type of feud, and the crowd recognized it, obviously they didn’t care for any of it. Fucking hell, Gedo & Jado really did a number on Naito with the horrific post-G1 booking. I can’t believe they aired this.

bad

Backstage, Naito is doing a post-match promo. Nothing to see or hear here.

Nakamura is talking about the Marufuji match.

King of Pro-Wrestling 2013

(2013/10/14)

IWGP Intercontinental Championship: Naomichi Marufuji vs. Shinsuke Nakamura ©

Very good match with some great moments and sequences, the layout was mostly tight and simple, I liked that. They built the match nicely and the finishing run was awesome. This was Marufuji’s best match in a long ass time, Shinsuke did one helluva carryjob here, although Marufuji wasn’t bad either, but that was evidently because Shinsuke was the clear creator of the shots inside the ring. Marufuji always looks acceptable outside that cesspool called NOAH.

***3/4

Marufuji is talking about the match backstage.

Minoru Suzuki enters the ring with his Army and challenger Swagsuke for the strap. Also, if he loses he must leave CHAOS and join SZKG. Shinsuke accepts.

Back in the studio, Shinsuke is reflecting on the match and says it was very refreshing to wrestle Marufuji, he thinks he’s a great wrestler and all that jazz, it was fun for him.