I thought they were just old now, but good to know Tenzan and Nagata sucked even in their prime.

Jan 17, 2024 2:28:41 GMT Lionheart said:

I thought they were just old now, but good to know Tenzan and Nagata sucked even in their prime.

This post made me laugh. I haven't seen enough of either guy to judge. A throwaway match on WCW's D show doesn't count. See if you can find Nagata vs. Yasuda on that NJPW World thingie of yours. 

Yuji Nagata's success in New Japan and All Japan is one of the great WAIT, WHAT as someone who only knew him from WCW, where he literally never, not even for a single moment, ever impressed.

Jan 17, 2024 2:43:08 GMT Kilgore said:

Yuji Nagata's success in New Japan and All Japan is one of the great WAIT, WHAT as someone who only knew him from WCW, where he literally never, not even for a single moment, ever impressed.

🤯 loved the guy. Though that was mostly due to some video game iirc.

I'm gonna have to go on a Yuji Nagata deep dive now, aren't I?

Jan 17, 2024 2:48:10 GMT Baker said:

Jan 17, 2024 2:43:08 GMT Kilgore said:

Yuji Nagata's success in New Japan and All Japan is one of the great WAIT, WHAT as someone who only knew him from WCW, where he literally never, not even for a single moment, ever impressed.

🤯 loved the guy. Though that was mostly due to some video game iirc.

I'm gonna have to go on a Yuji Nagata deep dive now, aren't I?

Yuji Nagata: An Investigation

My real time impression of him was that he was an extremely generic NOTHING wrestler to have no strong opinion about either way. Never bad, never great, he's just existing, man. He's out there doing stuff you'll immediately forget. 

Kilgore too late to save me. I've already begun Nagata vs. Taue. Gotta see it through.

Jan 17, 2024 2:48:10 GMT Baker said:

Jan 17, 2024 2:43:08 GMT Kilgore said:

Yuji Nagata's success in New Japan and All Japan is one of the great WAIT, WHAT as someone who only knew him from WCW, where he literally never, not even for a single moment, ever impressed.

🤯 loved the guy. Though that was mostly due to some video game iirc.

I'm gonna have to go on a Yuji Nagata deep dive now, aren't I?

We may need to get our 🤯 corrospondant Foos on the case to figure out why he enjoyed Blue Justice so much. I know holzhammer got him into Shibata back in the mid-00s, and I think it may have been an extension of that.

I appreciated Nagata more when he was in his elder statesmen role in the 2010s either taking on guys of his era like Minoru Suzuki or testing guys from the generation under him like Katsuyori Shibata. He perfected that mid-card epic match (think Flair/Taker @ WM18) where he wouldn't blow you away with his athleticism but he could build an effective match and was surprisingly charismatic.

Like a lot of WCW guys, Nagata hung around for a year but was only featured for a two month window where he beat Ultimo Dragon in back-to-back PPVs. There has to be a story there, because right after the Dragon feud, Nagata goes back to putting over guys like Prince Iaukea and Ernest Miller right after.

I'll let Big Evil 's reviews tell the story.

SPOILER: Click to show

{Halloween Havoc 97}Match #1: Yuji Nagata w/ Sonny Oono vs. Ultimo Dragon
This was what it was and wasn't that great. They both do alot of high flying spotty shit that hypes the crowd well for an opening match. I'm sorry I just can't get into Nagata. Dragon keeps letting himself get distracted by Oono on the outside and Nagata continuosly takes advantage. Dragon does more Asai Moonsaults then punches in this match. Dragon builds huge momentum going for his normal finishing run. Tenay notes Dragon has bone chips in his shoulder. Dragon hits the 360 Hurricanranna and sets up for the Dragon Sleeper, but Nagata takes advantage of the bad arm and ends it with an ARMBAR~.
Rating: **

SPOILER: Click to show

{World War 3 97}Match #3: Yuji Nagata w/ Sonny Oono vs. Ultimo Dragon [If Dragon Wins, He Gets Oono Alone for Five Minutes]
This is boring because Nagata sucks and Dragon has started to do as such. Heenan remarks anyone who faces a masked wrestler is stupid because they should just turn the mask around on them to blind them and then kill them. He's got a point. Dragon almost gets Nagata to submit after 12 minutes but Oono distracts the ref so he doesn't see it. Dragon takes Nagata up and hits the 360 Hurricanranna. Dragon has him pinned but Oono puts Nagata's leg on the rope. Dragon goes after Oono. Nagata runs at Dragon and Dragon hits a gato back kick? Dragon goes to back body drop Nagata. Oono gets back up and shoves Nagata's legs down so he falls atop of Dragon for a cheap pin.
Rating: **1/4

There's some other reviews out there that are far more glowing, but Big Evil doesn't seem to fall over himself giving these guys stars because they're exotic.

Lionheart Judging Tenzan and Nagata from a throwaway match in WCW is unfair to say the least.

In this thread reviewed Tenzan vs Kojima in an hour long match from 2005. I was surprised how much I enjoyed it. I'm still not sold on Yuji Nagata, but I haven't seen him in his prime either.

Jun 27, 2023 23:21:17 GMT Emperor said:

IWGP Heavyweight Championship / AJPW Triple Crown Championship (February 20 2005)

This is the first time I've seen either Kojima or Tezan in their prime. The match was excellent. I wouldn't say it was never boring, but it was far less dull than I expected. Even the slow moments were full of quality work. Both are great at the little things. The dullest parts came near the end when both guys were, understandably, selling for what felt like minutes at a time between moves. it was a real war of attrition where Kojima won due to having more gas in the tank. He couldn't overcome Tenzan's will to not take a fall against a wrestler from a different company, but he did overcome Tenzan purely on conditioning. Kojima's powerbomb to a large opponent deep into the match was an impressive feat. I appreciate the transition from Strong Style in the first half to King's Road in the second half, taking the best of both of their home promotions. A lot of time invested but I don't regret a single minute.

I don't know much about Nagata but I gots ta like him because when 🤯 was comparing everyone to puro "legends" he was who I got picked as...

Jan 17, 2024 8:09:53 GMT Emperor said:

Lionheart Judging Tenzan and Nagata from a throwaway match in WCW is unfair to say the least.

In this thread reviewed Tenzan vs Kojima in an hour long match from 2005. I was surprised how much I enjoyed it. I'm still not sold on Yuji Nagata, but I haven't seen him in his prime either.

I was being facetious since I thought it was funny they happened to be bad in this old match. Even in the past few years, Nagata has put on some damn fine wrestling on the incredibly rare occasion he is actually in a real match and really goes at it. That’s only 2-3 matches, but enough of a glimpse to show he has talent and was probably exciting in his prime.

Tenzan has shown no glimpses of that. So it’s a much harder sell to tell me he was ever good. But maybe his body just isn’t as strong as Nagata’s or he completely stopped trying a long time ago. But I certainly don’t respect Tenzan as an athlete now due to it. I respect Nagata, even if 95% of his matches now are going to be meaningless bores.

Kojima is good and has put on more great matches than Nagata for sure in recent years, but something about him just makes me not want to watch him. His super generic persona, I guess.

Ultimo Dragon vs. Yuji Nagata (w/Sonny Onoo)
Halloween Havoc '97

Curiosity got the better of me and DailyMotion like always had me covered.

According to the commentators, Ultimo Dragon and Sonny Onoo had a falling out and Yuji Nagata happens to be Onoo's new protege.

Well, this is awkward because maybe I'm also one of those dummies who likes exotic things? It was only a 10 minute match, but I found it fairly watchable and Nagata brought more to the table than expected. I thought his kicks looked and sounded great and he used them well. He also hit this sweeet gut wrench suplex that was so impressive he actually popped off afterwards which you rarely saw the foreign wrestlers do back in those days.

It did feel like a case where Nagata was completely shown up by Dragon. It seemed like Dragon got all his stuff in and looked far more impressive, but only lost because of his hubris and desire to get the Onoo's new submission expert to tap. I could understand walking away from the match not being all that impressed with Nagata but I thought he brought enough to the table.

In Meltzer speak I'd go ***.

Loving all this Yuji Nagata chatter. Vintage PW. I’ll break it off into it’s own separate thread once I’m home. Watched 5 Nagata matches myself over the past few days and I have thoughts. They too will be posted later.

Watched 6 Yuji Nagata matches over the past few days. Before I cover the man of the hour (which may not actually happen until tomorrow) lemme give you a primer on what I thought about Yuji Nagata up to a few days ago...

Not much. I mean that more in a literal sense rather than a diss. Yuji Nagata is just not somebody I thought about much. He was the top guy, or at least the smarks choice, that time I followed New Japan online for a day/week/month/season/whatever in the summer of 2003. The Nagata match that most stuck with me was his bout with Kurt Angle at Wrestle Kingdom 2008. Watched it on Youtube a few days after it aired because it had hype at the time. I didn't care much for it for reasons I forget. May have just been tired of Angle's formula by then. Around that same time I watched some Nagata in WCW where my thoughts were not dissimilar to Kilgore's. Thought he was a bland guy with a few nice suplexes. And I may have seen a few old man Nagata multi man tags on those rare occasions you guys coaxed me into watching a New Japan show in the mid 2010s. If so, I remember none of them, and certainly nothing Nagata did in them.

In closing, up to a few days ago I had seen maybe 10 Yuji Nagata matches in my life, and considered him a competent, yet bland wrestler whose only saving grace was throwing some nice suplexes.

Part 1: Yuji Nagata vs. Main Eventers

*Didn't plan it this way. Didn't even come up with the idea until the 6th & final match in this project. But I can break those 6 matches up into 3 distinct categories- 2 vs. Main Eventers, 2 vs. Mid Carders, and 2 Novelties. And that is the very order in which fate determined I watch them.

Yuji Nagata vs. Akira Taue- NOAH 6/6/03

Nagata is a NJPW guy invading NOAH so the crowd is extremely pro-Taue.

We get a genuinely great early test of strength. Taue lands the first big move with a back suplex into chokeslam. OK, I have to explain a few things about Taue in case you've never seen him. First, he has a weird Baba bod. Second, he spams the Chokeslam. That's his big move. But these aren't the big air chokeslams you're used to from guys like Taker, Kane & The Giant. The Taue chokeslam is more akin to a Rock Bottom. Late 90s me watching Japanese wrestling for the first time scoffed at the wimpy Taue chokeslam. I called it "the baby chokeslam." I'm much more receptive to it nowadays. It's not like I didn't buy the Rock Bottom as a big move. That back suplex into chokeslam was awfully indieriffic though. More 2003 IWA-MS than 2003 NOAH. Although....that generation of indie guys did fetishize the 90s All Japan that birthed Taue so it all comes full circle...or something.

Anyway, having landed the first big move, Taue controls for the next few minutes. Many chokeslams are attempted. Some are hit (a regular or two, one on the padded floor, one off the top rope), others are avoided (off the apron). Taue also hits a big boot and gets 2.9 off a sitout powerbomb. Crowd is into it. Nagata finally scores with an Exploder Suplex. That's his big move. I'm not even sure how I know that. I just DO. Yuji works the arm a little. Even gets real heel heat for doing an armbar on the apron. More stuff happens (it's been almost a week since I watched this and I forget a lot of details). Taue finally unloads with proper strikes on Nagata after previously doing a bunch of comical "Hi-ya Chops" (TM Mick Foley). Nagata gets a nearfall off a Super Exploder Suplex. And finally he puts Taue away with The Submission Severn Injured D'Lo With That Led To Brown Doing The Chest Protector Gimmick.

Verdict- Half-hearted review aside, this was a good match. Maybe even a very good match. But it blew my mind to find out this is considered a GREAT match by your PWO types. I just didn't see it. For me, it never reached that next level. Maybe if Nagata had zeroed in on the arm more. Maybe if Nagata had heeled it up more in front of an already hot crowd. So the initial "Nagata is bland" hot take of Kilgore & I holds true for now. Plus there were two pretty bad botches/hiccups. One even coming at a crucial moment. This was roughly on par with the Okada/Styles match I watched the other day. Went ***1/2 on that one. So let's go ***1/3 here. It's also worth noting Nagata was in rather a broomstick role being carried by Taue and a hot crowd.

Yuji Nagata vs. Scott Norton- NJPW 3/21/02

Nagata won the IWGP Championship for the first time two weeks later so I'm just going to assume this was a #1 Contender match.

What is Strong Style? A meaningless buzzword? The term Inoki chose to brand New Japan in much the same way Vince branded his WWF "Sports Entertainment?" To borrow from an ancient review I once read, "stiff, sloppy, stupid?" Or, on the flipside, "realistic pro wrestling?" Truth is it means different things to different people. Like "technical wrestler," Strong Style is in the eye of the beholder. You know it when you see it.

Pretty sure I first became aware of the term when it blew up on the indies back around 2003. Yep. 2003 it was. That's when IWA-MS started running a yearly Strong Style Tournament. I'm sure Gabe, Prazak, and the rest of the dweebs doing ROH commentary screeched "STRONG STYLE~!" whenever somebody no sold a death blow. Not gonna lie. When I hear "Strong Style" my first thought is dumb dumb Ishii no selling his way through a "5 star match" that actually sucks. Look, we all have our biases. I'm a sports entertainment guy til the day I die. What HTM called "a song and dance man." Having laid my biases out for all to see...

This was Strong Style done right. The Taue match was good. This one is better. Spoilers be damned. This is the Project Nagata cream of the crop.

Norton dominates the first 10 minutes with Nagata's only offense being a few feeble chops Norton no sold. The Flashman scored early with a big shoulderbreaker and kept the assault up from there. Another shoulderbreaker followed. And a powerbomb. Plus chops, clotheslines, armbars, a Samoan Drop, and other stuff. Norton, who even I, Scott Norton fan extraordinaire, has called a vanilla hoss in the past, did improve that aspect of his game a little bit because he learned to trash talk the crowd when on the offensive. His gruff, gravelly voice being a perfect fit for a man of his stature.

Nagata finally scores with his patented Exploder around the 10 minute mark. I do not question this despite Norton conservatively having 80 pounds on Yuji. The reason I don't question it is because "suplex master" was one of the two major things I knew about Nagata's in ring game for at least the past 16 years. Now Yuji is on the offensive. He kicks. And kicks. And kicks some more. Watching this had me surprised Emperor isn't more of a Yuji Nagata Guy. But Norton doesn't go down easily. He grunts. He grimaces. He no sells. And that too makes sense because LOOK AT HIM! It's OK to no sell basic kicks when you're a tank like Scott Norton. 18 wheeler cruising down the highway hits Scott Norton, who you got? I'm sticking with my guy Norton.

Now the one criticism I have of this match is an anticlimactic finish. Nagata just....kicks Norton again. And this time it's a 3. That was weak. But everything else about this ruled. 'Twas a real manly match without crossing the line into stupidity or overkill. Ron Garvin would approve. And you should too.

Verdict- ****. Strong Style done right. I dug the simplicity. First 10 minutes were all Norton. Final 5-6 were all Nagata. 

-For the record I have Nagata/Norton > "4 3/4*" Okada/Styles > "2nd best match from Japan in 2003*" Nagata/Taue.

*According to this guy Ditch who was one of the biggest Japanese wrestling fans on the English speaking Internet for a good 15 years

Nagata Watch: Looking good. 2 for 2 so far. Though he IS bland. Just not much there in the way of personality. First match he was carried a bit by circumstances. Second match was more 50/50, though I have a hunch he & Norton were perfect opponents for each other. I was surprised by how much kicking Nagata has done in these bouts since I remembered him mainly for his suplexes.

Part 2: Yuji Nagata vs. Midcarders

Yuji Nagata vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi- NJPW 4/29/06- New Japan Cup Match

The New Japan Cup is a single elimination tournament a la classic King of the Ring. 

Tanahashi was technically still an up and comer. He'd win his first IWGP Championship only three months after this. Unfortunately his hair don't here is on par with Tenzan's monstrosity from last week. I don't dare describe it. He resembles the Ricky Steamboat of 20 years earlier in physique and fluidity. Production is real bare bones. No commentary. Even the crowd is subdued. You can hear every grunt and groan. And Albert is sitting in the front row. It's an odd atmosphere. Not bad. Just weird.

Starts with mat wrestling. Tanahashi slips in an early dropkick. Nagata dodges a second attempt. Yuji works the arm a little. Tanahashi goes off with an insolent flurry of sick slaps to the face. Nagata Flair Flops. Tana is a dead man if Yuji ever gets back on offense. And sure enough Nagata scores with a rolling kick seconds later. Then he kicks Tana all over the body every bit as hard as Hiroshi slapped him in the face seconds earlier. The next few minutes are all Nagata. He kicks hard, works the arm, and sometimes combines both strategies by kicking the arm. Good stuff so far. Then we take a turn for the worse...

Nagata hits his patented Exploder Suplex....for a 1 count. Tanahashi is just totally fine now and goes on the offensive. He Hulked Up as if getting Exploder Suplexed is the Tanahashi version of the Reviving Elbow Drop. Tana controls for a few minutes where he spams some Sling Blades until Nagata finally scores with a back suplex. Then they go into a headbutt exchange. Nagata stiffs Tana (in the good way) with kicks and knees, including that CM Punk step up knee in the corner. We know Punk stole the Anaconda Vice from Tenzan. Now I'm convinced stole the corner knee from Nagata. Must have been an early 2000s NJPW fan. Nagata hits an Exploder Superplex. *sigh* Tana Hulks Up....again! Immediately this time. Didn't even have the decency to stay down for a 1 count. This match can go suck eggs. Nagata hits a few more big moves. Hulkoshi Tanahashi finally stays down off a wrist clutch exploder.

Verdict- A very dumb match. There actually was a lot of good wrestling here, but I can't get over those two no sells/Hulk Ups from Tanahashi. Killed it for me. Yuji Nagata was the much better wrestler in 2006. 

Yuji Nagata vs. Yutaka Yoshie- NJPW 8/10/03- G1 Climax Match

Yoshie is back. Read last week's Match Review thread entry for more on him. He seems fatter here, which is good, but his singlet is white rather than pink. 

Starts with mat wrestling which isn't as good as the mat wrestling in the Tanahashi match. I like how Yoshie made use of his fat. He hits these cool Vader Bomb style Bronco Busters. Also hit a splash or two and a Thesz Press. Did botch something off the top though. The hot crowd was behind him all the way with not infrequent "Yoshie" chants. At one point Nagata sold for two minutes straight. I forgot what wounded Yuji so much so I went back to find out. It turned out to be....a bodyslam on the padded floor. Meh. 

But the fat boy fun ends when a game Yoshie is hit with a Super Exploder. 1-2-NO! Yoshie kicks out. Meh. I saw that more as overkill than "OMG EPIC NEAR FALL~"! Especially since all that came after it was Nagata peppering Yoshie with more kicks, jumping high kicks to the face and back brain kicks, before finally finishing the fatty for good with a bridging Saito Suplex.

Verdict- Decent match I likely would have graded "Good" had it not went a minute/nearfall too long. 

Nagata Watch: The matches were worse in this batch, but Nagata's performances may have been better. If that makes sense? Well, unless Nagata is telling guys to kick out of/no sell his big moves. He's still stoic. Too stoic for my liking. That's just his thing. Like a less good Misawa. Meaning I'll never be a Yuji Nagata fan. But for now I'm a Yuji Nagata respecter. He's fine with his kicks and suplexes and refreshing lack of no sells.

Jan 23, 2024 16:31:35 GMT Baker said:

What is Strong Style? A meaningless buzzword? The term Inoki chose to brand New Japan in much the same way Vince branded his WWF "Sports Entertainment?" To borrow from an ancient review I once read, "stiff, sloppy, stupid?" Or on the flipside "realistic pro wrestling?" Truth is it means different things to different people. Like "technical wrestler," Strong Style in the eye of the beholder. You know it when you see it.

Pretty sure I first became aware of the term when it blew up on the indies back around 2003. Yep. 2003 it was. That's when IWA-MS started running a yearly Strong Style Tournament. I'm sure Gabe, Prazak, and the rest of the dweebs doing ROH commentary screeched "STRONG STYLE~!" whenever somebody no sold a death blow. Not gonna lie. When I hear "Strong Style," my first thought is dumb dumb Ishii no selling his way through a "5 star match" that actually sucks. Look, we all have our biases. I'm a sports entertainment guy til the day I die. What HTM called "a song and dance man." Having laid my biases out for all to see...

As the Strong Style moderator, and therefore the leading authority on Strong Style, I can confirm that you are right: it's a blanket term that means different things to different people. The core of Strong Style is the puroresu concept of "fighting spirit", the willpower to never give in, and keep on fighting no matter how much it hurts or how tired you are. That concept can be applied to different wrestlers of different styles. Another core feature of Strong Style is strike exchanges. Most Strong Style wrestlers enjoy initiating strike exchanges, but even the ones who don't (Zack, Okada, Tanahashi) are happy to play ball.

To a less seasoned fan Strong Style would be that go-go-go no-selly style that Tomohiro Ishii makes a living on. But also practiced by many NJPW wrestlers including Shingo Takagi, Hirooki Goto, Minoru Suzuki. That form of wrestling is the purest form of Strong Style, at least in the modern era, and it has bled into almost all NJPW matches and even matches in other companies.

In the early 2000s Strong Style was more about how "legit tough" you were, whether it was striking or being an MMA master.

Jan 23, 2024 16:31:35 GMT Baker said:

Nagata finally scores with his patented Exploder around the 12 minute mark. I do not question this at all despite Norton having a conservative 80 pounds on Yuji. Because "suplex master" was one of the two major things I knew about Nagata's in ring game for at least the past 16 years. Now Yuji is on the offensive. He kicks. And kicks. And kicks some more. Watching this had me surprised Emperor isn't more of a Yuji Nagata Guy.

It's true, you'd think a guy who kicks a lot and suplexes a lot would be my thing, but as you have observed, Nagata is just too bland and robotic. The most personality he shows is this terrible Undertaker imitation he does while applying a signature armbar.

That is not "Red Shoes" good hokey, but the worst kind of hokey. I don't know when he started doing it but the crowd loves it.

Kojima is my favourite of that generation. Kojima had (and still has) an edge and natural charisma that sets him apart from Nagata and Tenzan.

Yuji Nagata w/ Sonny Ono vs. Greg Valentine- WCW Main Event 12/20/97

Initially intended to wrap this project up after the Yoshie match. Then this popped into my feed. No way I could refuse such a delightful oddity. Talk about two ships passing in the night. Valentine peaked over a decade earlier. Nagata would peak roughly five years later. Yet here they are meeting in a promotion neither man is associated with. It's like a really wacky fanfic match that actually happened. You gotta love it.

The other day @ness brought up amusing Youtube comments. One that's stuck with me for years is "Greg Valentine looks like a lesbian aunt." Haven't been able to unsee it since reading. Unfortunately this is a nothing match. Valentine chopped, dropped a patented elbow, and I think he slipped in a Butterfly Suplex. Finish sucked. Ono got up on the apron. Ref came over to jaw with him. Nagata backed "The Hammer" into the ropes a few feet away from them. Ono kicked him right in front of the ref. Nagata hit the Exploder for the win. That might have been the biggest bump Valentine took in the 90s. Not that it was even a big bump, mind you. 

Verdict- A short, nothing match. Under *. Only interesting as a historical curiosity. Crazy as it sounds, I do think these two have a good match in them. But the 1997 WCW E Show just wasn't the place for it. But think about it. They're actually quite similar despite coming from very different times and places. Valentine was Strong Style before Strong Style became a buzzword. Both hit hard. Both are competent mechanics who lack flash. Both won with submissions. Chops vs. Kicks. Etc.

It would be unfair to write Nagata off based on a few mediocre matches on WCW's most irrelevant shows. But it IS a strike against him. Those shows do count! Take Disco Inferno. Disco was great at getting SOMETHING out of throwaway matches on the lesser shows. Am I saying  Disco Inferno > Yuji Nagata? Not necessarily. Though I'm not saying it's NOT true either. Frankly it'd take another project to provide a definitive answer. And that's not a project I'm in the mood for right now. Truth is they're very different wrestlers with very different skillsets. And Disco's set of skills may very well be more conducive to providing entertaining throwaway C Show matches.

Yuji Nagata & Manabu Nakanishi vs. Togi Makabe & Tomoaki Honma- NJPW 11/23/14- World Tag League Match

After watching the Valentine match I decided to add in a tag match for the sake of diversifying this project. Also wanted to watch Old Yuji for the same reason. Plus I wanted to cover a Honma match since I watched a bout featuring his turn of the century death match rival Ryuji Yamakawa a week or two ago. So I'm killing three birds with one stone here.

Honma had a cult following around the time this match took place. He has the hairstyle and bright trunks of our guy BOBCORE. Makabe I saw at least once before vs. Okada. No idea whether that match was any good or not. Going to assume it was average. I only remember it because Makabe upset Main Event Okada with a top rope knee drop of all things. That unexpected finish stuck with me. Nakanishi had a run as Kurasawa in 95-96 WCW. I wasn't a fan. Thought he was painfully boring. He had a mini feud with Road Warrior Hawk which may have involved (kayfabe) broken arms. He also lost to our guy Disco this one time on Nitro in a WMOTYC via disco ball interference in one of the all time bad finishes. Fwiw his WCW run was a few years before the Barenaked Ladies taught me Kurasawa made mad films in one of the definitive songs of the late 90s.

This is another nothing match. Credit to our guy Yuji though. He was pretty clearly the best guy in there. Really felt like he was the glue keeping this thing from completely falling apart. His partner Nakanishi SUCKED. I'm not sure the guy can bend at the waist. He moves around like a tired old man. He's doing a powerhouse gimmick despite not being much bigger than the other three men. And he completely whiffed on a chop that he aimed a foot over his opponent's head as if he were trying to hit an invisible Andre The Giant. Might have to gif that one up for your amusement. I was getting dying day AWA Ken Patera vibes from Nakanishi. And when you consider dying day AWA Patera is one of the worst I ever saw... Honma was....doing a comedy gimmick, I think? Crowd was into him though. Match was built around him hitting a diving headbutt. After missing a few tries, he finally does connect to a raucous ovation. Makabe was just there. Nagata finally put me out of my misery with a bunch of kicks and a bridging back suplex. Same finishing stretch as the Yoshie match btw.

Verdict- Another skippable match, though Yuji did keep it from flying completely off the rails.
=====================
Final Yuji Nagata Verdict- He's fine. A competent but bland wrestler who seems to work best in high profile matches. Recommended for fans of suplexers, kickers, and those who prefer sports-based wrestling over sports entertainment. So basically after one week of all this watching and writing we're right back to where we started lol. 

Nagata Matches, Ranked

1. vs. Norton- very good/great
2. vs. Taue- good/very good
3. vs. Yoshie- decent
4. vs. Tanahashi- dumb with some cool stuff
5. Tag Match- skippable
6. vs. Tenzan- real skippable
7. vs. Valentine- real skippable with an even dumber finish than the Tenzan match

Just saw AEW is running Bryan vs. Nagata this Saturday. How suspiciously timely. Thinking Coach Tony K is a PW lurker.

Jan 25, 2024 2:37:23 GMT Baker said:

Just saw AEW is running Bryan vs. Nagata this Saturday. How suspiciously timely. Thinking Coach Tony K is a PW lurker.

1000% he saw this thread and was like "OH YEAH? I'LL SHOW THOSE NERDS!"

Was there a Superstar Billy Graham to Yuji Nagata's Bob Backlund? Like a guy that clearly should have gotten the ball instead? Or was everyone just cool with Yuji Nagata's sleepy dependability? Maybe that was the entire appeal. Just woke up, but he's gonna whoop somebody's ass. 

Jan 25, 2024 4:01:36 GMT Kilgore said:

Was there a Superstar Billy Graham to Yuji Nagata's Bob Backlund? Like a guy that clearly should have gotten the ball instead? Or was everyone just cool with Yuji Nagata's sleepy dependability? Maybe that was the entire appeal. Just woke up, but he's gonna whoop somebody's ass. 

If anything, it would be like if Vince Sr decided that Inoki/Ali was the right direction to take and instead of promoting Pro Wrestling he was going to make Backlund into a legit shooter and put him in the ring with a bunch of legitimate amateurs and boxers and hope for the best.

Just about everyone from Nagata's generation got a run with the title - Tenzan, Kojima, Nakanishi, Makabe etc. but they realised early on that they had to skip ahead to Tanahashi. He held the fort till Okada arrived and while NJPW never reached the heights it once had, they were no longer in the doldrums and had enough international exposure to sell out the Garden.

Watching Valentine/Nagata, it's clear that Valentine was only going to take one proper bump for Nagata and it had to be the finish. I thought outside of that Irish Whip spot where it looked like a miscommunication, Nagata was fine here. The big mark against the match was the finish and even then it seemed to be on Onoo/Valentine for messing up the interference spot, what was Nagata supposed to do?

The only points you can give Disco is that he had enough common sense to avoid wrestling The Hammer on Main Event.

I did pop for the lesbian aunt line - that completely over-shadowed the match for me.

With that said, I wouldn't expect things to get MUCH better. Just about all his WCW matches were sub-5 minutes and most of them just look like filler. The only matches where he seemingly had an opportunity was those PPV matches against Ultimo Dragon and based on the Halloween Havoc match you really don't have to go out of your way to watch an above average match.

WCW in general had a bad habit of putting guys on TV for the sake of it. It'd be like tuning into WWF circa 2000 and Golga, Tom Brandi and Savio Vega are still popping up and having these throwaway matches. I tend to think Nagata really only had those two Dragon matches, the rest of the time he was just a filler working a match for the sake of a match.

Jan 25, 2024 3:54:51 GMT Baker said:

Makabe I saw at least once before vs. Okada. No idea whether that match was any good or not. Going to assume it was average. I only remember it because Makabe upset Main Event Okada with a top rope knee drop of all things. That unexpected finish stuck with me.

Makabe's finisher is called the King Kong knee drop, and back in his prime days he often set it up with a Spider German Suplex, which is a great one-two finish. He has the same GRRR ME TOUGH Strong Style ethos as Ishii, Goto etc. but he lacks the mobility to move as fast as those guys. His most renowned match is a IWGP Championship match against Okada where he was defeated. I had no idea he actually defeated Okada, but I assume it set up the title match.

Jan 25, 2024 3:54:51 GMT Baker said:

Honma was....doing a comedy gimmick, I think? Crowd was into him though. Match was built around him hitting a diving headbutt. After missing a few tries, he finally does connect to a raucous ovation.

Vintage Honma. The diving/falling headbutt is called the Kokeshi and he's been riding that train for a decade. It's literally all he does. He's terrible in every other way, yet somehow he's a fan favourite. They just love to see the guy fall on his head. He's the jobberiest of jobbers.

Makabe and Honma actually had some credibility as a tag team. Great Bash Heel, they're called. Wikipedia tells me they won the World Tag League in 2015 and 2016. A fact which still baffles me to this day. It's hard to believe Honma won anything.

Jan 25, 2024 4:01:36 GMT Kilgore said:

Was there a Superstar Billy Graham to Yuji Nagata's Bob Backlund? Like a guy that clearly should have gotten the ball instead? Or was everyone just cool with Yuji Nagata's sleepy dependability? Maybe that was the entire appeal. Just woke up, but he's gonna whoop somebody's ass. 

lol you're gonna love this.

The place I lurked at (think it was a guy named Zach Arnold's site) for that day/week/month/season/whatever in the summer of 2003 during one of my sporadic "I gotta get into Japanese wrestling!" kicks didn't have a Nagata replacement in mind. Their big gripe was Nagata hadn’t been pushed hard enough! Keep in mind Nagata was just a few months removed from a 13 month IWGP Championship reign (assuming I have my timeline correct). 13 months wasn't enough for these Nagataholics. He was their guy. He was their God. There was no one else more deserving of the spot in their eyes.

Maybe I got my wires crossed. It HAS been over 20 years. Maybe their real complaint was about Nagata not getting the belt sooner. Or maybe it pertained to Inoki killing his drawing potential by putting him in shoot fights. Idk. All I can tell you is those folks loved Yuji Nagata.

Your "sleepy dependability" line has me thinking maybe they saw Nagata as New Japan's Misawa? Still, 13 months is plenty long. Also got me thinking about that legendary BOBCORE line- "Gimme the belt. Then I beat everybody." BOBCORE dependably making the towns, beating everybody.

Jan 25, 2024 6:01:17 GMT Big Pete said:

The only points you can give Disco is that he had enough common sense to avoid wrestling The Hammer on Main Event.

I'm already knee deep (9 matches) into my next project (APW) but I was willing to put it on hold just to investigate my Disco/Valentine hypothesis. Alas, the two never locked horns. But I have a mental image of how that match would go. Or at least one moment. Hammer hits Disco with a bionic elbow. Disco holds his pained noggin while mugging for the camera- "Oww! My head. My HAIR! Ugh!" Disco getting something out of nothing. Making a nothing match memorable in a way Yuji Nagata failed to do.