Monday, February 13, 2017

Tiger Mask vs. Kuniaki Kobayashi (NJPW, 11/4/82)


A motivated Tiger Mask is the best Tiger Mask. I thought this was a very impassioned performance from Mr. Sayomiya, with plenty of energy, dexterity, and a little extra spicy mustard behind his strikes. Hell, before he can even remove his belt, Tiger’s tossing Kobayashi over the ropes and diving onto him full speed. Kobayashi was a decent enough opponent with his flourished kicks but Tiger was the standout here. The way he so deftly lands on his feet off the back bodydrop, his swanky takedowns and reversals, and a ton of innovative for the time offense, like the backflip kneedrop, the front neck chancery takeover, and the jumping tombstone piledriver. With Tiger able to mule kick his way out of Kobayashi’s various holds, the frustration builds and Kuniaki starts going after Tiger’s mask. Eventually, it costs him the match, as he starts ripping at it with Tiger in the ropes and the referee calls for the bell. Afterwards, a pissed off Tiger Mask and goes after Kobayashi and the two fight to the outside. This was a fun workrate match, where the submission holds were only meant to kill time, but it was one of Tiger Mask’s better individual performances.  

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