Pro Wrestling Chronicle

Kota Ibushi & KAGETORA vs. Shuji Kondo & Oyanagei (El Dorado 2/27/08)

Shingo Takagi & BXB Hulk vs. KENTA & Taiji Ishimori (Dragon Gate 3/20/08)

I watched these two back to back a few days ago and saw some similarities and differences. Thought I’d blog about it starting with the embarrassing fact that I have trouble telling the difference between Ibushi and Ishimori. Too many wrestlers in the world not on my TV every week. I apologize to the Japanses indy lovers.

I’ll start with the El Dorado match since I watched it first. In many ways the El Dorado and DDT promotions feel like developmental for Dragon Gate to my unfocused eyes. I’m not completely hip to the scene so I often rely on my pal MG to fill in gaps when I have questions or need context. But as that thought goes, I thought this match was high level for an indy and could certainly find a home in the mid to upper card at a now bigger time Dragon Gate show. That’s not to say this was worked as a mid card match, rather I felt that on this night the guys in the match were good enough to be higher on a Dragon Gate card as a comparison.

Ibushi is a lot of fun to watch, but a part of me enjoyed the work of KAGETORA more. One thing I came away with on both sides was that all the men had the athletic ability and training to be complete workers, even if they weren’t persona-wise or body-wise major league. Everyone had solid mat wrestling, good reversals, timing, and understood the buildup of the match. There were times I felt like less could be more, but that’s true of a lot of Japanese wrestling, and it’s a different mindset and taste, so that’s not a fault of the match. The match lost me a few times when they were going through the all out final section of the match, but English commentary or more context could have helped that. It’s a common theme that I tire on bigger moves not paced better, but I’m a hypocrite in that if I had seen this in ROH, having the comforts of context, language, and familiarity, I would have liked this match a lot. I do enjoy the tag formula when it breaks down like this, even if scaling back with rules has become more refreshing to me at this stage in the game.

A higher level version of this match is found in the Shingo Takagi & Hulk BXB vs. KENTA & Taiji Ishimori match up. On this day I enjoyed Ishimori more than Ibushi, though both are great. I liked KENTA is this environment, even if watching his matches begins to kill “shoot kicks” for me the way the Austin Era killed punch/kick brawling for me. The stories seemed more defined in the match for someone who doesn’t follow the promotion. KENTA was being a prick to Shingo, who wanted his hands on this invader. Hulk and Ishimori have a battle of one-upsmanship early. Hulk takes a beating and must get to Shingo for the hot tag to save his team’s chances. Lots of teased moves and counters that pay off later. The match up ends appropriately with KENTA and Shingo, where Shingo shows his fighting spirit to the end. Hulk is much of the same, but KENTA is too much. Of course, KENTA has to expend an awesome amount of energy to finally put Shingo away, and it’s kicks after the G2S that does it. I could argue it should have been the G2S finish, but perhaps the kicks with Shingo defiantly on his knees are more appropriate.

The work in the Dragon Gate match is tight as can be and triple speed, so if you’ve never seen the product, this is one you’d wanna jump all over. It’s a tad more refined with a big show atmosphere, while the El Dorado match is about developing talent.