#junakiyama

Zero-One’s Official Youtube

Video of the match

This is the first in a hopefully long running series I will do looking at an older Japanese match. 

I’m starting with Puroresu-Rewind, but it’ll have two sister series called Lucha Libre Time Machine and another called Lucharesu Rewind Machine where I look at classic Lucha from Japan or Japanese talents wrestling in Mexico.

I decided to start with Puroresu-Rewind because thus far all the content on the blog has been CMLL related. I love CMLL, but I love all wrestling and don’t want to have tunnel vision. So today we are looking at :  

Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama vs. Shinya Hashimoto & Yuji Nagata (ZERO-ONE March 2nd 2001)

Who’s who?

Mitsuharu Misawa 

Wearing his signature green and white pants, Misawa is arguable the best wrestler of all time his name coming up in any GOAT discussions that have Puroresu fans. 

One of the Four Corners of Heaven(4 Famous wrestlers from AJPW) and a man that has more 5* matches than most with 25 Meltzer rated 5* matches and a coveted 6* match. 

Don’t just take Meltzer's word for it, Tokyo Sports gives year end wrestling awards and has since the late 70′s and they have given him 5 MOTY awards(1995, 1997, 1998, 2003 and 2007). 

Also, Misawa was #2 in the PWI 500(1997) who are famously focused on the United States/WCW/WWE wrestling scene. The person above Misawa on the list in 1997 was Dean Malenko for those curious. Misawa was in the PWI top 10 5 times in his career, the list only being a thing since 1991.

Misawa would be the big star for AJPW until he decided to make his own promotion in the year 2000 called NOAH. This is one of the 2 shows that Misawa did for Zero-One wrestling, which was the promotion that Hashimoto created in 2001.

Jun Akiyama

Wearing white trunks and boots, Akiyama was about 5 years younger than Misawa. He and Misawa had many 5 star matches through the late 90′s tag teaming together. Jun Akiyama would also be a big star for Misawa in NOAH, being champion there many times. In 2013 Akiyama would leave NOAH with many other NOAH talents and join AJPW. Where he worked as a wrestler for about a year before AJPW made him the president, which he currently still is while also being an active wrestler for the company as well. 

Shinya Hashimoto

Shinya Hashimoto is the host in this situation, Zero-One wrestling being a company he created. This event was the first ever Zero-One PPV and this match was the first main event. Wearing black pants and a red belt, which is common for him to wear. Hashimoto is known for his martial arts style and signature high kicks... which are well displayed in this match. 

He initially wanted Zero-One to be an independent affiliate to NJPW and perhaps even be called NJPW Zero-One. NJPW refused and would later fire Hashimoto, so he registered Zero-One and created a new wrestling brand for the 21st century. Zero-One was an open promotion that had working agreements with almost all the companies of Japan allowing Zero-One talents to wrestle elsewhere and hold other promotions belts. 

Shinya Hashimoto and Mitsuharu Misawa have many things in common, they both founded wrestling promotions that defined the independent scene in Japan after the turn of the century, they were both the top stars of NJPW/AJPW respectively, they both are known for their stiff work, They both are considered the leading member of Japanese groups. Misawa being the top Four Corners guy and Hashimoto considered the best of his group The Three Musketeers. 

Perhaps the most grim thing that Misawa/Hashimoto have in common is their early passing. Misawa famously died in the ring after he took one bump too many causing a cervical spinal cord injury he was 46 in 2009, while Hashimoto died of a brain aneurysm when he was only 40 years old in 2005, a year after he stepped down from Zero-One amongst financial issues. 

Yuji Nagata

Much like Jun Akiyama, Nagata is slightly younger than his partner, though is still older than Jun by 2 years. Yuji Nagata would not be a staple of Zero-One, instead Nagata has been a very loyal NJPW talent. The only year of his career that Nagata worked more for another company is in 1997 when he wrestled for WCW, who he also worked with in 1998 about as much as NJPW. Roughly 40-50 matches for both companies in 1998.

He is wearing Blue trunks and boots here dressed similarly to Jun Akiyama, but different colors. He is pretty well highlighted here and looks pretty good. Him teaming with Hashimoto vs Misawa and Jun Akiyama is basically a matchup of NJPW(Nagata)+Zero-One(Hashimoto) vs AJPW+NOAH(Misawa/Akiyama)

How is the match?

Really good! It’s a fantastic main event for a first show. It’s almost hard to believe your eyes because these talents are so well associated with other big brands. Hashimoto vs Misawa, singles match never happened as far as I know. So seeing them fight here is really interesting, It’s akin to Hogan vs Flair or Stone Cold vs Goldberg, or Sting vs Undertaker. It’s definitely dream match material and we got it briefly in this main event tag match from Zero-One. 

It’s hard not to smile watching this match because you are seeing 4 of the best men to lace up boots all tossing fists and one another around the ring. It’s a brisk 20 minutes that passed by quickly because there really isn’t much fussing around. It’s a stiff fight where Hashimoto nails some of his signature high kicks, Nagata and Akiyama trade suplexes, Nagata hits his rolling kick, and Misawa/Hashimoto clashing is akin to Godzilla vs King King. Two icons throwing down in a test of who’s the best. 

My main complaint with this match is one that’s made in hindsight. Perhaps, Hashimoto was hoping to get these three other men more often in his promotion. It seems weird for the first main event to feature 3 talents that wouldn’t work that often in this promotion. 

Perhaps another NJPW talent who became a mainstay in Zero-One would have been better like Shinjiro Otani. I’ll fully admit this is just in hindsight criticism, because Hashimoto might have thought NOAH/Zero-One crossovers would have been more common than they really were. 

People also might not like the ending because it’s a little abrupt, but I think it works well because at least it’s conclusive. It’s not a time limit draw or a countout(Which are prevalent in many old AJPW matches). They had a winner and a loser, even if the ending is hectic with all four men involved in the action and the security coming after the match to pry Hashimoto off Jun Akiyama.

Leaving this match, my one sore spot is the fact we never got the Hashimoto/Misawa match of our dreams. It’s a shame Hashimoto passed as early as he did. Misawa had a classic 5* and Tokyo Sports MOTY tag match in NOAH in 2007, and was still an active wrestler til his death in 2009. 

Hashimoto vs Misawa could have been a barnburner match for the ages, but was lost to time and unfortunate circumstances. This tag match is a great glimpse at what could have been, but also is a greater glimpse of what was. A photograph in time of some of the best workers to ever set foot in a ring, all in one ring.

Zero-One has had a bumpy road over the last 16 years, but it's still standing! While they may never have a main event with as much starpower/linage as their first, many great talents have worked their over the years. Guys like Steve Corino, Samoa Joe, Low Ki, Ikuto Hidaka, and of course Shinjiro Otani who has been their since the beginning. It’s nice to know that despite their passings both Hashimoto and Misawa’s legacies live on through promotions they created.