NJPW - Skydiving J - 06/17/96
Tokyo Budokan
13,500 Fans
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLC353671E9F0F4B48
WAR INTERNATIONAL Jr. HEAVYWEIGHT TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH;
01.
Lance Storm & Yuji Yasuraoka (c) vs El Samurai & Norio Honaga
NWA WORLD Jr. HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH;
02.
Masayoshi Motegi (c) vs Shiryu (Kaz Hayashi)
WWA WORLD Jr. LIGHT HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH;
03.
Gran Hamada (c) vs Tatsuhito Takaiwa
UWA WORLD Jr. LIGHT HEAVYWEIGHT DECISION MATCH;
04.
Shinjiro Ohtani vs Kazushi Sakuraba
CMLL WORLD WELTERWEIGHT TITLE MATCH;
05.
Super Delfin (c) vs TAKA Michinoku
WAR INTERNATIONAL Jr. HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH;
06.
Ultimo Dragon (c) vs Gran Naniwa
MPW BRITISH COMMONWEALTH JUNIOR HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH;
07.
Dick Togo (c) vs Jushin 'Thunder' Liger
IWGP Jr. HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE MATCH;
08.
Great Sasuke (c) vs Black Tiger (Eddie Guerrero)
Classic New Japan show here from '96 - this was just two months before the J-Crown title was formed, and on this show all 8 belts that make up the J-Crown were defended by their respective owners. The first awesome match on the card sees Shinjiro Ohtani & Kazushi Sakuraba compete for the vacant UWA title in an excellent UWFi style match, lots of awesome submissions and transitions, great work from both guys and the least Juniors-style match here. Next, Super Delfin defending CMLL World Welterweight Title against TAKA Michinoku nearly stole the show, both guys work full speed throughout and it's an excellent display of the puroresu-lucha style common to M-Pro. Both guys are incredibly well versed with each other, so while it's not the most technical or well thought out matchup, it's still a ton of fun. Meltzer gave this one 4 *'s.
Now, the real show stealer was the semi-main event as Dick Togo defended the MPW title against Jushin 'Thunder' Liger in an amazing match that saw Togo, the heel, essentially playing a babyface role as Liger just utterly dissects him, working over the arm brilliantly while Togo's excellent selling easily gains him sympathy from the fans, who pop huge when he makes his comeback. Meltzer gave this one 4.5 *'s, a real match of the year candidate for 1996. That just leaves the main event, which sees Great Sasuke defend his title against Eddie Guerrero under the Black Tiger mask. This is a strange match that starts out with a whole lot of mat work from Eddie on Sasuke's arm, before breaking down into a sprint for the last 5 minutes or so. Not bad by any stretch of the imagination, but Togo/Liger would've been a much more appropriate main event.
The aftermath of this show sees Liger challenge all the other title holders to a four night tournament which took place during the annual G1 Climax and where the titles defended on the show above would be unified to form the J-Crown Octuple Unified Championship.