Editor’s Note: Please welcome to the arena Cody, ol’ dad himself. He is both Happy Wrestling Land’s newest contributor but also one of its’ oldest friends, an original poster on the Happy Wrestling Forums and father of multiple children. You can find him on Twitter @CoderBaglieffen.
Hello! I’m Cody. When it comes to wrasslin’, I follow my gut and whims, but tend to love classic AJPW. So, I’m starting there. In 1991. I’ve been mostly burnt out on current wrestling, mostly due to focusing on WWE, but I’m trying to rekindle some love.
I probably won’t watch full shows, I’ll skip some main events and hop around to wherever my squirrel brain takes me. Any sort of cohesive plan is daunting, I won’t stick to it, and you can’t make me. I didn’t even watch them in chronological order, so there.
1.26.1991 – Stan Hansen vs. Johnny Ace
Who doesn’t want to see Johnny Ace get beaten up by Stan Hansen? The match starts off amicably enough, but of course dumb Johnny pisses Stan off and gets smacked with a chair a bit. Hansen’s bottom rope elbow drop is one of the simplest, most effective looking moves in wrasslin’. When Johnny kicks out of it, Stan immediately follows up by doing it off the middle rope instead. Johnny gets a couple of flash pinfall attempts near the end, but the crowd doesn’t buy it – nor should they. We’re all waiting for the Western Lariat and it promptly puts an end to things. Hansen slides under the bottom rope without even getting to his feet to celebrate after the three count, cause he has better places to be, apparently.
This is a wonderful 7 minutes to show somebody new to Stan Hansen, just to explain who he is and what he’s all about. The same could probably be said for any 7 minutes of his career, though. **3/4
2.23.1991 – Kawada & Kikuchi vs Taue & Ogawa
We’re joined in progress with Kawada already bloodied and it’s just a fun 7 minute hit of a match from there. Poor Kikuchi, bless him, gets hucked out of the ring by his partner onto Taue, then hucked out of the ring by Taue onto his partner. Then he has to be saved by Kawada, manages to kick-out of Ogawa’s fisherman suplex, which the crowd completely bought into. He has a brief moment of fire before tagging in Kawada. Kawada and Taue hit eachother hard and are probably cursing each other out, but eventually Kawada uses the same enzui-lariat that beat Taue a month prior to keep him out of the ring long enough to put Ogawa away.
Great quick hit of fun, heated wrasslin’ where everyone plays their role, perfect for a father of 4 who nods off to everything these days (me). ***1/2
1.19.1991 – Triple Crown Championship Match – Stan Hansen © vs Jumbo Tsuruta
These guys! I don’t recall them ever having the classic both would have with so many other people, but they’re both such joys to watch.
Jumbo doesn’t get phased at all by Stan’s starting the match by brawling rather than a collar-and-elbow tie-up. Stan gets frustrated, takes a walk, goes back in and decides to do some wrasslin’ holds. They struggle over every little thing, with Jumbo trying to escape all sorts of headlocks, eventually breaking free with an armbreaker. Things escalate from there and Jumbo gets hit in the face with a Western Lariat. They trade a few quick nearfalls and Jumbo eventually surprises Stan with a Giant Baba style Neckbreaker Drop to pick up the win and the belt.
Stan’s pissed, they brawl some more after the bell and I look forward to seeing them do it again sometime. This was a perfectly fun, sub-20 minute title match that left room for bigger and better encounters down the road. ***3/4
2.26.1991 – World Tag Team Championship – Terry Gordy & Steve Williams © vs Mitsuharu Misawa & Toshiaki Kawada
Before the bell rings, Terry & Steve (we’re friends, it’s fine) beat up on our heroes a bit and celebrate by running the ring ropes together. It’s adorable. The crowd loves it, I love it. But then, they get the crowd to boo them later as the jerks that they are, which is a testament to how good they are and how easy it is to root for the demise of anyone who opposes sweet toothless Kawada and the new daddy in town.
This is the Kawada show. He takes a beating, but regularly gets his offense in as the match goes on. He saves Misawa a couple times and you get the feeling he has it in him to maybe beat these hillbillies.
The match goes from good to brilliant when the small, regular interruptions from the non-legal members of each team escalate. Kawada hits the first highspot of the match, a back suplex on Williams. Misawa rushes to keep Gordy out of the ring, which gets the first real nearfall of the match. With Gordy and Misawa occupied, the crowd gets antsy. Williams is able to swing the momentum in his favor, while Gordy detains Misawa, but Kawada doesn’t need him – yet.
Shortly after, Gordy powerbombs Misawa on the concrete floor outside the railing and returns to the ring to team up on Kawada. For the rest of the match, the camera cuts to Misawa, who is completely knocked out. The WWE watcher in me is wondering why they don’t just keep Misawa out of sight so he can eventually have the shocking, heroic return. But that doesn’t happen. They have the patience to let Kawada survive some big hits and to even almost surprise the champs himself. They’re not just trading bombs, either. There’s a back and forth struggle and a good deal of clobbering for a while. Ultimately, Kawada just can’t kickout anymore. But man, the fire.
You get the feeling that Kawada might be able to beat either of these guys by themselves, but together, he needs his teammate. It’s a hell of a showing, though, and the crowd eats it all up. Such disappointment when the final bell rings. Maybe next time, friends.
What a beautiful match.
Champion’s Carnival next, maybe
