May 29, 1998 in Sapporo, Japan
Nakajima Sports Center drawing 3,200
WHEN LAST WE SPOKE things could not really have gone any worse for Kiyoshi Tamura than they did, could they (have)? Mere seconds into his bout against the increasingly enormous and also just pretty good Valentijn Overeem, it was not only clear that Tamura was in over his head, but just as clear (to us) that Tamura knew it, and it was not great to see! Do you think Akira Maeda spoke with him afterwards in a spirit of kind fellowship? Do you think maybe he shoot kicked him a little? Maybe something in between? We are offered footage that neither confirms nor refutes either of those speculations but that suggests, unrelatedly, that Maeda will face the (long-injured, long-absent) Yoshihisa Yamamoto at the upcoming CAPTURED event in July, supposèd to be Maeda's final match (we know that to prove, in time, a fiction). Also as prefatory matter we are given RINGS Official Rankings that appear as follows: 10. Kopilov 9. Zouev 8. Tariel 7. Naruse 6. Nijman 5. Vrij 4. Kasteel 3. Kohsaka 2. Han 1. Ilioukhine CHAMPION Tamura.
HIROMITSU KANEHARA'S BOOTS SAY "UWF" I cannot help but notice a little ways into the opening match betwixt him and Lee Hasdell. That time is being trimmed already, only five minutes or so in, is clear from the use of graphical "wipes" so I guess they must go/have gone super long? The most prominent feature of this match so far, and yeah they are up to the fifteen minute mark in an instant, is Hiromitsu Kanehara lying atop Lee Hasdell forever; please note that this is not a complaint, but, on the contrary, pretty much what I am here for (that he also attacks credibly with both the reverse-arm-entanglement of gyaku-ude-garami 逆腕絡 and the arm-crushing-crossmark-hold of ude-hishigi-juji-gatame 腕挫十字固 feels like grace). Kanehara, up by several thousand points, takes the thirty-minute decision win.
I think Christopher Haseman is a very good opponent for Kenichi Yamamoto in that he is low-key excellent at this, while, at the same time, is also far less likely to slice Kenichi Yamamoto to hideous flesh-ribbons like Valentijn Overeem did a couple shows ago (before he got to Tamura). This could maybe go better? In fact it does! Yamamoto wins by hadaka-jime strangle in a pleasingly action-packed (but not too action-packed) 12:39 shoot-style encounter that saw many rope breaks and several knockdowns! And he did not, to my eye, get cut up even slightly. Huge improvement for him.
Joop Kasteel, the spectre of having gotten so tired against Pete(y My Heart) Williams that he just didn't stand up after a rope escape still looming over him, must next contend with Grom Zaza, the silver fox of Fighting Network RINGS and presumably also of Georgian Olympic Wrestling though I do not know that second part factually (there could be a silver-more fox). This one might be a shoot? OK no, it is not, given the way Zaza went down from a slap just now (I am not suggesting slaps cannot "shoot" knock people down, just that the way it happened just now was not a credible instance of it). Kesa-gatame, desu the commentator says and I cannot agree more fully. Zaza is up several points on rope escapes, all (I think?) from the straight Achilles hold of kata-ashi-hishigi. Oh hey I was listening to the Bryan Alvarez/former DVDVRMB-poster "Filthy" Tom Lawlor Filthy 4 Daily audio show yesterday and in a discussion of whether they should call a particular waza "The Walls of Jericho" or "The Lion-tamer" or simply "A Boston Crab," Alvarez noted that he had seen a "shoot" Boston Crab depicted in an old judo book but forgot the proper terminology for it but would endeavour to find out, so on twitter I shared with him this knowledge:
He has yet to thank me.
Grom Zaza wins at 5:54 not with the double-leg-crush of ryo-ashi-hishigi but instead a standing application of the single-leg-crush or kata-ashi-hishigi:
That all of the above comes from Mikonosuke Kawaishi is a fact.
Next we are offered, in digest form, an account of 4/25/98 show in Ekaterinburg, Russia. There's a graphic for it and everything:
There is all kind of great training footage, and I am always eager to see any of that that can be shown. The best part--and I do not say this lightly, because I really do like all of it-- is for sure this sign that says sambo:
Let us look to the venerable prowrestlinghistory.com to summarize the results in full:
Russia vs. Holland
April 25, 1998 in Ekaterinburg, Russia
Sports Palace drawing 7,000
Masayuki Naruse beat Ochirov (2nd) via decision.
Bob Schrijber TKO Yuri Bekichev (1st - 3:01).
Georgi Keandelaki TKO Mikhail Shimov (2nd - 1:17).
Hiromitsu Kanehara TKO Todor Todorov (9:17).
Mikhail Ilioukhine beat Christopher Haseman (8:47) via submission.
Yuri Korchikin beat Joop Kasteel (6:23) via submission.
Andrei Kopilov beat Craig Booth (1:12) via submission.
Vladimir Kuramenchev KO Hans Nyman (4:46).
Volk Han beat Dick Leon-Vrij (4:21) via submission.
Akira Maeda beat Nikolai Zouev (3:53) via submission.
Seems like a good one! The clips of the finishes were exciting! Maeda won with a mae-hadaka-jime front choke over Nikolai Zouev in an ungreat (though not bad) match that was shown in full.
BACK TO 5/29/98 THOUGH as that pleasant digest interlude fades into memory and Masayuki Naruse has mistakenly had his hair cut into a less floppy "state of being" before he faces Mikhial Ilioukhine. Although plagued at times by those huge, too-light pick-ups that do nothing for the live-crowd and that actively irritate me, this otherwise fine encounter ends at 13:52 with Ilioukhine's ashi-dori-garami (figure-four toe-hold). The highlight, to me, was an especially good harai-goshi 払腰 or sweeping hip that Ilioukhine threw with a couple minutes before the end. I would like to see more of that going forward!
WAIT WHAT IT IS TSUYOSHI KOHSAKA VS. VOLK HAN and it is being presented as though it were just an ordinary match, so ordinary a one, in fact, that they're not even showing full entrances for either of these peerless nobles, these taught men and cunning; it's just like, ok, here are a couple of the guys we have and they are to græpple. But this is actually a really big deal! You will perhaps recall their excellent earlier encounters, the first of which ended when Kohsaka's face turned into a face made of blood at MAELSTROM 5th? And then they were re-matched at MAELSTROM 6th and Kohsaka hit his unreal rolling kouchi-makikomi minor-inside sacrifice technique into a hiza-hishigi knee-crush/calf-slicer only for Volk Han to find a juji-gatame in there somewhere in one of the best pure-waza finishes in RINGS ever? Well this is probably going to be good too! Wrist-lock takedown to juji-gatame to gyaku-ude-garami (as celebrated in Kimura's name) is how Han chooses to open things but it is only seconds later that it is instead Kohsaka who has taken the cross-mark position to apply his own juji-gatame. This . . . is already quite good. Han crumples to the mat off a hard kick to the body but answers the count despite his hurt guts. He really is not going to stop with that standing gyaku-ude-garami that worries me so, and I am just going to have get used to it, aren't I. Han drags Kohsaka down with it for juji-gatame, but Kohsaka grabs a foot for the ashi-dori-garami we discussed earlier in the context of Ilioukhine/Naruse and Han heads to the ropes. A grim leg-tangle later, it is Kohsaka who needs do the same. This continues to be good. Some crisp (for these guys) striking follows, until Kohsaka drops low for a tackling morote-gari 双手刈 (two-hand reap) into juji-gatame but before you know it that crafty (cræftig) Volk Han has another leg lock! (Rope break, TK.) Han wishes to pause a moment to readjust his knee-pads, and Kohsaka obliges civilly. Han slips behind for hadaka-jime! But he leaves his ankles open for hiza-tori-garami! But Volk Han frees a leg for juji-gatame! But TK slips out for a juji-gatame of his own! Rope break, Volk Han! If anything I am not exclaiming enough right now! Kohsaka eats a horrifying knee to the face and asserts his place of primacy atop the list of guys who take strikes most convincingly in shoot-style pro wrestling (Volk Han, for his many, many virtues, is un-near the top of any such ranking). How will Han answer TK's hiza-juji knee-bar? Ah, with the hiza-hishigi knee-crush/calf-slicer, of course; of course. Each man is down like four or five points and we are nearly ten minutes in, I think. OR WE WERE (wait, we still are) as Han taps at a totally weird point in the match at 10:10! I think Han blew the finish, if I may speak frankly, as he tapped whilst Kohsaka was transitioning from hadaka-jime to juji-gatame, from naked strangle to crossmark hold, at a moment where he wasn't really totally held in either. Han looks upset at himself after the finish, and I can't tell if it is a worked "oh shoot, I got caught!" or a shoot "I worked that terribly." Bad finish, but an excellent match until then, I would say.
Ah, so the Kiyoshi Tamura vs. Bitsadze Tariel main event will be for the RINGS Heavyweight Championship (a title I reject)! I can tell because the kindly-looking white-haired gentleman in the red jacket is here:
This is weird, plainly, in that Tariel is ranked eighth, so why should he be fighting for "the strap"? I say once more that any championship other than the annual tournament title is a false step that betrays the original RINGS ethos of pseudo-Olympian pro-græpplesport internationalism and I reject it. It is nice to see that Kiyoshi Tamura, despite his recent stunning loss, remains handsome:
Aaaaaaaand now we know what happens when you lose a shoot that Akira Maeda would have liked you to have won: you get shoot-style squished by Bitsadze Tariel in 3:39 and lose your RINGS Heavyweight Championship in a merciless, battering romp. Tamura was knocked down twice inside the opening, I don't know, maybe forty seconds? And it never really got much better. One knockdown actually sends Tamura rolling out under the bottom rope and to the floor, and then the head-kick knockout, this utter drubbing the clear price exacted for shoot-failure. A dark work environment!
WHAT DID DAVE MELTZER SAY:
May 4, 1998:
"4/25 Ekateringburg, Russia (RINGS - 7,000 sellout): Masayuki Naruse b Ochirov, Bob Schreiber b Vladimir Bekchev, Georgi Kandelaki b Mikhail Shimov, Hiromitsu Kanehara b Todor Todorov, Ilioukhine Mikahil b Christopher Hazemann, Corchikin Youri b Joop Kasteel, Andrei Kopilov b Boose, Vladimir Kuramenchev b Hanse Nyman, Volk Han b Dick Vrij, Akira Maeda b Nikolai Zouev. RINGS ran 4/25 in Ekateringburg, Russia before a sellout 7,000. With Kiyoshi Tamura out of action with injuries suffered in the Valentijn Overeem match one week earlier, Akira Maeda, who wasn't scheduled on the show, worked the main event beating Nikolai Zouev in 3:53. The top Russian star for the group, Volk Han, beat Dick Vrij from Holland in 4:21. Maeda was going to Russia in part to try and negotiate with Alexandre Karelin to be his final opponent, however no meeting took place. Tsuyoshi Kohsaka didn't do the show either and the fact he wasn't put in as a replacement may lend credibility to the idea he's less than 100% which is why he's out of UFC."
In regards to an upcoming UFC:
"Both Tsuyoshi Kohsaka and Vitor Belfort appear to be off the show for sure, Kohsaka due to RINGS claiming he's suffering from dizziness, and Belfort because the sides can't come to money terms."
May 11, 1998:
RINGS comes up in a condemnation of an ECW show generally and Sabu vs. RVD specifically (*1/4):
"With more money on the line than ever before, with more pressure to perform than any time in the history of the business, and with more demanding and smarter fans that recognize this as a performance and not a sporting event where winners and losers actually matter, the physical toll and physical expectations have gotten way out of hand. Whether it's Misawa or Michaels or Toyota a few years back who have to put on the greatest match of all-time or something resembling that whenever they headline a big show or a PPV, to people in Pancrase and RINGS doing real shoots or very brutal works far too often, to small guys who never would have been let in the door in other eras making up for it by wowing fans with dangerous acrobatics, to less physically talented but incredibly motivated and hungry guys who really do love the profession and go to extreme lengths to do spots people will remember, the end result of today's game and the new levels of brutality and match quality was evident right before our eyes."
Dave's all over the place in this issue (the best issues):
"Occasional true shooting matches did take place as pro wrestling, but they were probably less prevalent than even in today's wrestling due to RINGS and Pancrase. Because they were shoots under the rules of wrestling, and like submission fighting today, they either ended quickly and decisively, or lasted a long time and were boring to the general public."
May 18, 1998:
"OTHER JAPAN NOTES: RINGS on 5/29 at Sapporo Nakajima Sports Center has Kiyoshi Tamura vs. Bitzsade Tariel for the RINGS world heavyweight title, Tsuyoshi Kohsaka vs. Volk Han, Ilioukhine Mikhail vs. Masayuki Naruse, Joop Kasteel vs. Grom Zaza, Wataru Sakata vs. Kenichi Yamamoto and Hiromitsu Kanehara vs. Leo Hasdell. It is not a definite that Tamura will be ready since he really took a beating in his last fight, against Valentijn Overeem, which apparently was a shoot (still haven't seen the tape). Tariel is God awful, like a Russian Jim Duggan, but he's well over 300 pounds and probably the most amazing performance of Tamura's career was carrying that slug to a fantastic match last year." This is savagery, anti-Bitsadze savagery.
May 25, 1998:
Ctrl+F "RINGS" brings us further news of Carlos Newton (Carlos Newston):
"3. In the other under-200 semifinal, Carlos Newton (3-1) beat Bob Gilstrap (5-3). Newton is a 21-year old who has won the Canadian Jiu Jitsu championship the past two years [my time in Ontario came later, but word was Newton competed in like *every* jiu-jitsu and judo tournament in the province for years--ed.] and has also fought before in EFC and Shooto and has a match on 6/24 at Budokan Hall for KRS against former UFC heavyweight tournament winner and pro wrestler Kazushi Sakuraba. He's also an awesome fighter to watch because of his speed. Gilstrap, a protege of Maurice Smith, who was his corner man, most recently fought in a shoot match for RINGS on 3/28. Despite giving away probably 30 pounds, Newton took Gilstrap down and went for an armbar right away, but Gilstrap got away, but was almost immediately trapped in a triangle choke and tapped out in 52 seconds. Not that this is any excuse, but Gilstrap had just recently fallen off his motorcycle and tore up his a.c. and will be needing surgery on it, but didn't cancel the fight."
Also:
"OTHER JAPAN NOTES: After the 5/29 show in Sapporo, RINGS has announced shows for 6/7 which will be the company's debut in Australia but not sure what city (Christopher Hazemann vs. Kenichi Yamamoto plus seven more matches), 6/20 at Korakuen Hall (Tsuyoshi Kohsaka vs. Kenichi Yamamoto plus six more matches), 6/27 at Tokyo Bay NK Hall (Kiyoshi Tamura vs. Kohsaka, Hanse Nyman vs. Vladimir Klementiev, Wataru Sakata vs. Willie Peeters which is a rematch of their dirty disputed match in Holland and Hazemann vs. Kenichi Yamamoto which I'll assume will be Yamamoto getting his win back after putting Hazemann over in Australia) and its biggest show of the year on 7/20 at the Yokohama Arena which is now being said will be Akira Maeda's final match against Yoshihisa Yamamoto, plus Tamura vs. Valentijn Overeem (no doubt Overeem will put Tamura over in a worked match) and another rematch of a huge upset with Paul Varelans vs. Dick Vrij. Apparently they couldn't get a major martial arts superstar to work with Maeda and do a bigger building for his farewell. Speaking of Kohsaka, he is expected to move to Seattle soon and train full-time with Maurice Smith and compete in both the U.S. for UFC and for RINGS in Japan."
June 1, 1998:
Dave gets tape of FIGHTING INTEGRATION 2nd:
"JAPANESE TELEVISION RUNDOWN 4/16 RINGS: 1. Hiromitsu Kanehara beat Sander Thonhauser in 6:26 with an ankle lock. This looked to be a shoot. Thonhauser, a fighter from Holland, was really aggressive but Kanehara had too much ground experience for him. Solid match; 2. Gogitidze Bakouri beat Wataru Sakata in 8:44. It was hard to tell what this match was but I'd bet against it being legit because Bakouri was suplexing Sakata all over the ring. Then again, he is a Greco-roman wrestler (from Gruziya) and had a 51-pound weight advantage, but the suplexes looked too pretty. Sakata tried several submissions, and got a choke on the ropes for a point and an armbar for another point. Bakouri ended up doing four suplexes in the match, and after the fourth one got an ankle lock for the submission. Kind of interesting to watch; 3. Masayuki Naruse beat Andrei Kopilov in 7:19. This was definitely a work. Kopilov, who had a 57-pound weight advantage, dominated the match, taking a 5-1 lead in rope escapes before Naruse got him with a front guillotine. Okay for the style; 4. Tsuyoshi Kohsaka beat Joop Kasteel in 7:49. This also appeared to be a work and Kasteel got a top wristlock for a rope escape point very quickly against a man who is very difficult to beat with a submission. The score was tied 3-3, with Kohsaka getting one point via penalty when Kasteel threw a punch to the head for a yellow card, before Kohsaka got the submission with an ankle lock; 5. Valentijn Overeem scored the biggest upset in years in RINGS beating Kiyoshi Tamura in 3:56. There is no question this was a shoot, as Overeem totally destroyed this group's world heavyweight champion. Overeem would have been considered a safe opponent for Tamura in a shoot, but nobody understood just how much he's improved and how dangerous he is. It was one of those fights where you see a guy go into the ring thinking he can't lose, and all of a sudden he's getting his ass kicked royally. Overeem, who is only 22, is about 6-3 1/2 and 220 pounds with strong striking and lightning quick submissions and really is someone UFC should consider as he'd destroy most of the heavyweights they have. He almost immediately got a guillotine and Tamura, shaken up by how quickly he got trapped, got a rope escape. Tamura then took Overeem down and when he went for an armbar, Overeem escaped, and got behind him with a choke for another rope break point. As Overeem used his reach and speed to start getting more strikes in, Tamura went to the ground. Eventually Overeem got a kneebar on the ground in the middle and Tamura had no choice but to tap, although he waited too long to tap, probably a pride deal since he's a world champion losing to a no-name and his pride cost him an injury because his knee was messed up. As shoot matches go, it was really exciting because of how surprising everything went; 6. Volk Han beat Akira Maeda in Maeda's final career match in Osaka in 5:43 with an armbar. Maeda weighed in at 265, the heaviest of his career and appeared pretty much out of shape. Even so, it was a decent match, although hardly the quality of match these two used to have years ago."
The birth of MMA is the death of NHB:
"MMA: The changing of this heading from NHB, for No Holds Barred, to MMA, for Mixed Martial Arts, is largely based on several conversations with UFC commissioner Jeff Blatnick who noted there are holds barred in UFC (in particular, joint locks attacking the fingers and toes) and that NHB connotates a sport with no rules. This change has also caused us to make some changes in promotional placements. These are arbitrary and subject to debate without a doubt, but here goes. MMA will categorize UFC and other Vale Tudo type of events, along with Shooto, K-1, Draka, KRS (Pride) and events such as wrestling submission fighting events using major names or other promotions featuring freestyle fighting events. The judgement on these events is not that whether they are 100% real as opposed to worked as almost all of pro wrestling is, but whether they themselves market themselves within the pro wrestling world primarily and get coverage in pro wrestling publications. Even though KRS has a pro wrestler (Nobuhiko Takada) as its biggest drawing card and did a few worked matches on its first show and does market itself heavily within the pro wrestling world, it is considered as MMA. Pancrase, RINGS and USWF will still be listed under pro wrestling, regardless of what is and isn't a shoot. All three groups market themselves as wrestling and within the wrestling world. Pancrase and RINGS are probably around the fourth and fifth biggest wrestling companies in Japan. USWF, based on its attendance figures, has to be considered the No. 4 pro wrestling promotion in the United States even without having any television at least until another group besides WWF, WCW and ECW can regularly put 4,000 fans in an arena."
Mitsuya Nagai update, from the K-1 section:
"Promoter Kazuyoshi Ishii at the show was talking about the 16-man tournament in August and said that he was inviting pro wrestlers Mitsuya Nagai (who had worked for RINGS before retiring/being fired earlier this year and who has done some pro kickboxing), Ryushi Yanagisawa (Pancrase fighter who has also done pro kickboxing), Yoji Anjoh and Shinya Hashimoto. I'd guess there would be basically no chance for the latter one."
A reader writes:
"Having seen the A&E special, I find myself interested in acquiring information on Ed Lewis, Frank Gotch and Farmer Burns. Specifically, I'd like to know where I could get the books of Lou Thesz, Mike Chapman and Sheldon Goldberg. Is it true that Farmer Burns trained Frank Gotch?
On a different note, it seems that RINGS is moving toward a total shoot promotion. This was evident on the 4/16 show. With Akira Maeda retiring, I expect that the younger Japanese wrestlers will begin having shoots on every show. I think they were testing the idea with the Kiyoshi Tamura vs. Valentijn Overeem match, in which Overeem took Tamura to school. Overeem's total domination of Tamura probably has Maeda thinking twice about letting his champion fight in a shoot again.
Jonathan D'Antoni
Bellerose, New York
DM: Gotch, who was a wrestling prodigy in Iowa, lost in an 1899 match with Burns, but Burns was so impressed he began training him. They wrestled a few times over the next several years and in 1903, when Gotch beat Burns, it set him up for a match against the American champion Tom Jenkins, which Gotch won which set him up as a big drawing card and one of the country's biggest sports heroes. Both Burns and Jenkins later became regular touring "opponents" for Gotch in his early title reign. Mike Chapman wrote a book on Gotch and another on Dan Gable and Danny Hodge, and he can be contacted at P.O. Box 794, Newton, IA 50208. For info on Thesz' book, you can write to P.O. Box 8686, Norfolk, VA 23503. As best I know, Goldberg has never written a book on wrestling history. I've been hearing for months now that as the current generation of RINGS headliners like Maeda, Volk Han and Dick Vrij fade from the scene, the idea is that RINGS would become a shoot promotion, but I don't see it happening because physically guys can't shoot that many times without their careers taking a tumble well before they hit their drawing power peak because of injuries. As all shoot promotions have shown, nobody really knows for sure how a shoot match will turn out. My feeling is RINGS will always have some shooting, and will always protect marketable draws."
June 8, 1998:
Dave gets tape of FIGHTING INTEGRATION 3rd . . . in a timely fashion! Oh wait not tape, just results, my mistake:
"OTHER JAPAN NOTES: In a huge surprise, Bitszsade Tariel, a 315-pound Russian karate fighter who is probably the worst worker in the entire company, captured the RINGS world heavyweight title beating Kiyoshi Tamura in 3:39 when the ref stopped the match due to Tamura's knee injury on 5/29 in Sapporo before a disappointing crowd of just 3,200. Don't know what to make of the result, as on paper it makes no sense unless they are using Tariel as a transitional champion to put Tsuyoshi Kohsaka over as the group's new top star after Tamura got hammered in the shoot last month [I would it were so, Dave, I would it were--ed.]. You wouldn't think they'd put Tamura in a shoot with him going in injured as he waited way too long to tap last month to Valentijn Overeem with the title at stake and in the main event, although rumor has it that is what it was and that Tamura's knee was bad going in and the ref had to stop it quickly. I'm skeptical. Kohsaka beat Volk Han for the first time in his career in 10:10 with a choke while Ilioukhine Mikhail beat 209-pound class champion Masayuki Naruse in a non-title match in 10:52 with a leglock. Akira Maeda was once again at the show talking about bringing RINGS to the United States. Maeda also said they haven't picked his final opponent for September, but said that he wasn't interested in his final match being against either Shinya Hashimoto, Genichiro Tenryu or any big-name pro wrestler that he had never faced before."
June 22, 1998:
Heeeeere's the tape:
"5/29 RINGS: 1. Hiromitsu Kanehara beat Lee Hasdell by a 6-0 score after they had gone the 30:00 time limit. This appeared to be the only shoot match on the card, with Hasdell always staying near the ropes so that Kanehara could never finish him. There were good standing exchanges in the first 10:00. From the 10:00 to 20:00 mark, Kanehara got Hasdell tired out and dominated him, scoring five points using an ankle lock, a shoulderlock (hammerlock) and a few armbars that were just about completed as Hasdell always got to the ropes. The final 10:00 mainly consisted of Kanehara on top of Hasdell controlling him; 2. Kenichi Yamamoto beat Christopher Hazemann in 12:39 with a choke. This was a very good match in that they were exchanging finishes with rope breaks but it still visually looked credible, although it was obviously a work. Hazemann has turned into the best undercard foreign worker in the promotion and Yamamoto is very good within this style as far as making things look legit. This appeared to be a home-and-home deal as Yamamoto beat Hazemann in Japan, and in exchange Hazemann beat Yamamoto on the 6/7 show in Brisbane, Australia. Lots of rope breaks and knockdowns going back-and-forth with Yamamoto leading 9-8 when he got the tap from a choke; 3. Grom Zaza beat Joop Kasteel in 5:54 with an ankle lock. Zaza, a former Olympic games wrestler, pretty well took Kasteel down at will and kept going for clumsy standing ankle locks with Kasteel always going to the ropes. It appeared to be a work, but it was surprising in a work just how much they had Zaza dominate Kasteel, who is something of a name here, on the ground. It will all Zaza except for two knockdowns by Kasteel, as he was ahead 8-4 with all the points coming from rope breaks with Zaza going for the ankle until the finish. Zaza works and is often compared by the wrestlers to a Russian Severn and this was kind of a sloppy match; 4. Ilioukhine Mikhail beat Masayuki Naruse in 13:52 with an ankle lock. Of all the worked matches on the show, this looked the most believable and was the second best match on the card. Naruse is all banged up from working such a brutal style every month but these are two guys of about the same size and same ability which made the even match totally believable. Mikhail even worked a half crab submission into the repertoire; 5. Tsuyoshi Kohsaka beat Volk Han for the first time ever in his career in 10:10. This wasn't as good as their classic matches in 1996, but was still the best match on the show and the second best match in the promotion so far this year. Great mat wrestling and escapes, and since both are over with the crowd as being super shooters, it added to the drama. It was Han's best performance in a long time as he pulled out great submissions and his matwork was incredible, plus they worked some great back-and-forth sequences on the mat. When he's in with someone of the calibre of Kohsaka, Han really shines as being really a class above from a technical standpoint any pro wrestler in the business. After trading big moves, Kohsaka got the submission really almost out of nowhere with an armbar; 6. Bitszsade Tariel captured the RINGS world heavyweight title from Kiyoshi Tamura in 3:39. This was one of the weirdest matches and results when it comes to a world title change of this era. First off, Tamura was coming off being blitzed in an actual shoot on 4/16 against Valentijn Overeem (which in hindsight is probably one of the most important results of a pro wrestling match this year as far as long-term repercussions to a major office). On the finish, Tamura waited way too long to tap and clearly his knee was wrenched badly. Tamura's knee wasn't even close to being ready at this point, although that was incorporated into the story line. What was weird is not that Tamura would lose the title due to his injury as that is logical, but that he would lose it to Tariel, who clearly means nothing as exemplified by all the empty seats even at ringside for this show which actually had a strong undercard. The match itself was a total squash, totally different from their classic last year. It was Tariel weighing 310 and Tamura at 195, and Tariel just overpowered him standing, knocking him down several times before catching him with a beautiful kick to the side of the head for the knockout. During the match, Tariel stayed away from Tamura's knee rather than played into it to explain the squash. The way the match went, they were seemingly building for Tamura's dramatic comeback, but he actually did nothing the entire match and the response after it's over is that Tamura, the company's biggest star and top draw with Akira Maeda's impending retirement, has been exposed as far as being a top-flight shooter over his last two matches to the point that you almost only want to see him against smaller guys and he can't be taken seriously on top. It also renders the world title as something of a joke just a few months after it was created when a guy with no ground skill who can't work and isn't over like Tariel holds it, even if he's just a transitional champion to get the belt to someone like Kohsaka if that's even the plan. To Tamura's credit, the match looked totally legit even though it wasn't."
OK! What to do with Tamura now? And how to get the belt off of Bitsadze Tariel and onto someone likelier? I suppose we will find out soon enough! Until then I thank you once more for your attention to these matters, and for your time.
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