Jumbo Tsuruta (c) vs. Genichiro Tenryu - Triple Crown Championship Match 7

This is somewhat of a sad moment for me.  The last big match (I am sure there a few more tag matches) between Jumbo and Tenryu.  If you have read this far, you know of my love for both, and how the June 5th match of the previous year is in contention for greatest match of all time.  Shortly after this match, Tenryu leaves (and takes some of the All Japan roster with him) to form Super World Sports.  This radically changes All Japan for the next decade (for the good).

This match takes place on April 19, 1990 at the Yokohama Cultural Gymnasium. Again, this one is nowhere near as epic their match from the precious year, but it is truly great and incredible in its own way.  Before the match even starts, Stan Hansen attacks Tenryu on his way to the ring.  The attack ends with a Hansen Lariat to Tenryu in the corner to take him out.  What is important to note here is since his arrival in the early 1980's, the Hansen Lariat has been sold as death.  If he hits it, no one gets up.  It is the ultimate finishing move in the promotion.  Now what really makes this strange is that the previous year Hansen and Tenryu were tag team partners.  I don't know what caused the split, since just 9 months before Hansen was celebrating a Tenryu Triple Crown win.

Hansen does get on the mic and say since he just took Tenryu out, he should get the title match.  I do not know if this is all there is to it, and Hansen wants the title shot, or there was a genuine split.  But Jumbo arrives and drives Hansen off.  Tenryu eventually rolls into the ring and Jumbo goes to check on him.  Tenryu slaps Jumbo right to the face and then the war is on.  Time has certainly not tempered the battle between these two!

As incredible as the pre match is, with Tenryu and Jumbo, you know the actual match itself will be great too.  The match itself is a sprint, only going about 14 mins.  The work is stiff and Jumbo wins at the end with a Backdrop Driver.  Since they are only going a short distance, there are no rest spots, it is all action.  I was surprised that it was so short, and also somewhat surprised at how quickly they built to the end, without a whole lot of drama.

The post match is great, as Jumbo calls out Hansen who shows up again and the two have a pull apart brawl.  Hansen laying out various All Japan Young Boys has always been one of my favorite sights, and this brawl features some of that.

So this is a much watch.  The match itself is fun, but the pre and post match antics make it an overall excellent experience.

This match leads to one of the most famous moments in wrestling history, which we will cover in our next post!

Jumbo Tsuruta (c) vs. Barry Windham - Triple Crown Championship Match 6

I will state right up front, this may be my least favorite Triple Crown title defense of all time.  It is certainly not a bad match.  As I have mentioned, at this point in time Jumbo is one of, if not the, best in the world.  And throughout the 1980's, Barry Windham was one of the best as well.  This match is from early 1990, and Windham has not yet suffered many of the injuries that would eventually take him down.

The match itself is fine.  Nothing spectacular, but solid wrestling.  It's fault is it only goes twelve minutes and never really gets going, when suddenly Jumbo hits a side suplex / backdrop driver and the match is over.  Except for when Windham dropped Jumbo crotch first on the guard rail, the crowd never really got into the match. Overall, it hardly seems worthy of a Triple Crown title defense, especially at Budokan Hall.  Looking at the card from this night, it was second from the top with a Double Tag Team Title Match (Stan Hansen and Genichiro Tenryu versus the Miracle Violence Connection) as the Main Event.  So I am sure Giant Baba did not want to upstage the tag team final and had this match go short and in rather subdued fashion.  But still, in hindsight it is rather disappointing.

The best part of the match happens before the action even begins, with Lord James Blears reading the title proclamation.  Blears, as the head of the Pacific Wrestling Federation, the kayfabe sanctioning body of All Japan Pro Wrestling.  As the commissioner, Blears helped  give a sense of legitimacy and formality to the All Japan titles as well as helping promote AJPW as a legitimate promotion and the matches as real and genuine sporting events.

Genichiro Tenryu (c) vs. Jumbo Tsuruta - Triple Crown Championship Match 4

Once again we have Jumbo versus Tenryu for the Triple Crown Championship.  However, unlike their past matches, this time Tenryu is the champion.  In their previous match, one of the greatest of all time, Tenryu finally got the big pin on his long time mentor and then rival.  I really enjoyed this match, although it was obvious from the opening that the crowd was not as hot as their last match, and the dynamic between the two had changed a bit with Tenryu finally having defeated Jumbo.  I would consider their last match, nearly perfect in every regard.  So even if the atmosphere of this encounter is not quite at the same level, it is by no means anything short of excellent still.

I think a very strong case can be made that from the mid 80's through say 1990 or 1991, that Tenryu was easily in the top five wrestlers in the world.  And I would argue that Jumbo was the very best (sorry Ric Flair and Keiichi Yamada).  There was a point in the mid 80's, about a year after Riki Choshu and his army invaded All Japan, that Jumbo went on offense attacking Choshu's ribs after one match, and then again before the next, that Jumbo's character and personality seemed to take on a new dimension.  He eventually evolved into the surely veteran that we saw in the early 90's, but for the remainder of the 80's, he had an edge to him, that in my view made him the best in the world.

So any match up between two of the top 5 wrestlers is going to be excellent, and this match up certainly showed it.  Each wrester tried to hit big moves to the start the match, Jumbo with his knee and Tenryu with the enzuigiri, but the other was able to avoid.   There was still a clear amount of disdain between the two and that was evident throughout the match.  Jumbo may have shown a bit of new found respect for Tenryu, but still the two men tore into each other with a definite amount of hatred.

What I loved about this match, as I do many All Japan matches, is the struggle.  Throughout the match, Tenryu kept trying to hit his big power bomb for the finish.  Yet each time, Jumbo would struggle to avoid getting hit with it.  As I watched, I kept expecting Tenryu to wear him down enough to finally get the move.  Yet Jumbo kept battling out, and as the match progressed, the crowd kept getting hotter and hotter.  After numerous attempts, Tenryu seems to FINALLY get Jumbo up, only for Jumbo to pull over sort of a poor mans hurricanrana and shockingly get the pinfall.

So in the last Triple Crown match of the 80's, Jumbo wins back the title and is the new champion.  This will set the stage for perhaps the greatest decade of title matches in history.

Genichiro Tenryu (c) vs. Terry Gordy - Triple Crown Championship Match 4

Watching this match really made me sad. It reminded me just how awesome Terry Gordy was, especially when he was in All Japan. He was great in Texas and Mid South, but it was in All Japan rings were he truly demonstrated his complete skill. He was truly ahead of his time as a mobile and athletic big man who could deliver quite the beating. Terry is definately one who left us way too early.

Our setting for this match his Budokan Hall, Sept 2, 1989 and is Tenryu's second title defense. We get the amazing Lord James Blears reading the Title Match proclamation, including the match being sanctioned by both the National Wrestling Alliance and the Pacific Wrestling Federation. And once the reading is done, the streamers hit and Tenryu attacks Gordy's second (I couldn't tell who it was although I think I should have known) and gives him a power bomb. Gordy then attacks Tenryu and gives him a power bomb of his own. An amazing start to the match.

The match is itself is really good, very strong and stiff, although a bit short. It probably goes 12 minutes, so it certainly isn't an epic.  And although the crowd is into the match, they never become unhinged.  But with that said, it is a fun 12 minutes.  Gordy is on offense for most of the match and we can see how versatile he is.  He moves great and throws some crazy stiff clotheslines during the match.  As much as I like Tenryu, I really think it is Gordy who shines here and his offense just looks so great.

They build most of the match around the two trying to maneuver the other into position for a power bomb.  Eventually, Tenryu hits it, but Gordy kicks out!  Tenryu then gets him up again, but Gordy reverses it and kind of rolls through the attempt.  But Tenryu holds on and gets him up again and hits it, bringing the match to an end.

Really great stuff and it is too bad Tenryu soon left AJPW because this could have been a great rivalry with sequences of matches that continued to build upon one another.


     

Genichiro Tenryu (c) vs. Yoshiaki Yatsu - Triple Crown Championship Match 3

This match is from July 18, 1989 and is AJPW Triple Crown Champion Genichiro Tenryu's first defense of his newly won Triple Crown Championship.  For those not familiar with Yatsu, he was a former Japanese Olympian in wrestling who started with New Japan in the early 80's.  When Riki Choshu jumped to All Japan in 1984, Yatsu was one of those who jumped with him.  The two formed a very successful tag team in battling many of the AJPW regulars.  But when Choshu jumped back to New Japan, Yatsu ended up staying and formed a new team with Jumbo Tsuruta which was also very successful, in fact one of the most successful in AJPW history.  So since 1985, Tenryu and Yatsu have been battling each other nearly continuously, usually in tag match.  Jumbo and Tenryu versus Yatsu and Choshu are some of the best tag matches of all time.  And the finals of the 1988 Real World Tag League with Tenryu and Toshiaka Kawada versus Yatsu and Tenryu is one of the matches of all time.

So with Tenryu having just defeated Jumbo for the titles, his first defense is against Jumbos own partner Yatsu.  This match was very good, but not extraordinary like the previous match.  I can usually tell which buildings each match is in, but I wasn't quite sure where this took place.  The heat and crowd involvement was so/so but they never really got really into it until the end.

Both are dressed in black and have similar structures, so at times during the match, it is hard to tell who is who.  The first two thirds is filled with mostly mat wrestling, chops and enzuigiris, with Yatsu getting most of the offense in.  I think my favorite spot is when Yatsu slips to the ropes and Tenryu gives him multiple hard kicks until he falls to the floor.

At about the 15 minute mark the two end up outside where the match turns into much more of a brawl and involves Tenryu dropping a table on Yatsu which opens up a nice cut on his head.   Once back in the ring they move to the finish, where Yatsu gets a couple of nice near falls on Tenryu before Tenryu reverses with an enzuigiri and then his power bomb for the win.

So a nice 18 minute or so match but nowhere near as good as the previous Jumbo and Tenryu match.

 

Jumbo Tsuruta (c) vs. Genichiro Tenryu - Triple Crown Championship Match 2

I didn't actually see any All Japan matches until the early 90's. And then what I saw were the big matches, usually on some sort of puro compilation. It wasn't until the last decade where it became easier to order DVDs of previous eras, or later with youtube, where I could begin to catch up on much of the All Japan that I had missed.

So it wasn't until a few after the fact that I saw this incredible match between Jumbo and Tenryu. I had always heard about it and knew that Dave Meltzer had given in 5 stars.  But when I saw it, I knew it was one for the ages, and certainly one of the greatest matches I had ever seen. And just recently my friends at Death Valley Driver voted it the greatest All Japan match of the 80's!  And re-watching it now, I can see nothing to make me change my mind.

The match holds up incredibly well. In fact, we start to the this match lay the foundation for later big All Japan matches, from the location, to the pre-match look as the wrestlers await their entrance, to the huge crowd with incredible heat, to the stiff and violent match in the ring.

The setting for this classic is Nippon Budokan, usually known as Budokan Hall, on June 5, 1989. As we discussed, their last championship match apparently ended early with Tenryu being knocked out by a potentially botched spot, that being a bad power bomb. We noted how the two were a great tag team for a long long time, and over the past two years, Tenryu has been trying to emerge from Jumbo's shadow. The crowd here knows the history between the two and is electric from the start. One of the best and most involved crowds I have ever seen, as they know they are viewing an epic encounter between two gladiators. Two huge personalities, two of the biggest stars in Japanese wrestling putting together something incredible.

As in the last match, Tenryu avoids a Jumbo handshake to start and the two go at it almost instantly with brutally hard strikes (that just stiffen as the match goes on). When Jumbo goes for a running knee almost instantly and Tenryu ducks and then hits a German Suplex for a nearfall, we know we are on! The two build upon their previous match with a great attempt by Tenryu to avoid the Jumbo power bomb. The match is filled with amazing spots all over and I could write pages trying to capture them. Instead, I encourage everyone to watch this match and bask in how amazing it is.

An important aspect of the match is that when Jumbo finally does start hitting his big power moves (throwing bombs is how I have referred to them when I appear on various podcasts), they are building off of the end to the last match.  Multiple times he again appears to knock Tenryu out.  Tenryu doesn't appear able to kick out, but it is always close enough to the ropes that he escapes pinfall. 

As I noted, the atmosphere is electric and the two build the match almost perfectly, with the last five minutes being an incredible display of nearfalls that keep the crowd (and me too!) on the edge of their seat. When Tenryu hits a lariat, enzuigiri and then a power bomb of his own, the crowd becomes completely unglued. Jumbo kicks out and Tenryu must go to the well one more time. Another power bomb and this time he has done it, Tenryu has defeated his former mentor and climbed to the top of the wrestling world. With Stan Hansen there to watch and congratulate him, Tenryu then blows off Jumbo one more time, once again refusing the shake the hand and figuratively snubbing his nose at Jumbo attempting to pass the torch to Tenryu as the new man within All Japan.

This match is everything I love about pro wrestling. The build, the crowd, the emotion and the brutality of the encounter. I like the current product as much as anyone and have really come to enjoy many of the high spot oriented matches of today. But I will take a more traditional big match like this over anything else. This might not be my favorite match of all time, but it would certainly be in my top 2-3. Just flawless in nearly all aspects. Go watch this match!

Jumbo Tsuruta (c) vs. Genichiro Tenryu - Triple Crown Championship Match 1

I love Tenryu. I have nothing but respect for Jumbo and I do enjoy his matches (I have often said from 86-90, Jumbo is the best wrestler in the world). But of all the wrestlers who made their home in All Japan at various points during the 1980's, I would say that Tenryu is probably my favorite. He is remarkably able to blend and adapt to different styles of matches, whether they be brawls with the likes of Stan Hansen and Bruiser Brody, or a more traditional technical strong style match with opponents like Jumbo. Whatever the type or style of match, he never seems out of place.

Sadly, this will be one of the few Tenryu matches in the Triple Crown series. In the Spring of 1990, he departed All Japan to form the Super World of Sports promotion. While this deprived us of his skills and abilities in All Japan during the 1990's, it forced Giant Baba and All Japan to radically change their internal hierarchy and push wrestlers like Mitsuharu Misawa, Toshiaki Kawada and Kenta Kobashi well before he typically would. But the end result of this sequence of events was the greatest series of wrestling matches ever, as we will document here.

This match is from April 20, 1989 in Yokohama and is the first defense of the newly established All Japan Triple Crown. For years, Jumbo and Tenryu were partners and allies in fighting the Riki Choshu lead invasion of All Japan. But after Choshu's departure back to New Japan, Tenryu and Jumbo have had a rivalry and engaged in multiple high visibility tag and singles matches, including a match later in this series that is without a doubt one of the greatest matches of all time.

The friction between the two is obvious immediately as Jumbo offers his hand in sportsmanship while Tenryu wants nothing to do him. This sets the tone for the match and at times, just the looks between the two, with Tenryu often displaying somewhat of an aloof attitude, is enough to get the crowd going. I loved the first few minutes of this match, with the two working hard to kick and beat the other into a sense of submission.

The match eventually settles into a lull in the middle, with an extended chinlock sequence. But it does pick up again and includes an awesome suicide tope from Tenryu that is remarkable for a man of his size. After a bit Jumbo is able to gain the upper hand and take control. Soon he moves into position and begins what appears to be a false finish sequence. He gets Tenryu up for a power bomb of sorts, but botches it and not only doesn't get Tenryu up very high, but drops him on the back of his head for the spot, instead of onto his back and shoulders. It appears that he completely knocks him out with this move and Jumbo is forced to end the match prematurely with a pin, instead of what I assume was going to be a more dramatic set of false finishes from both men, before either would eventually get the win.

I don't know if my assessment is correct.  But do note that this does play huge into the next match of the series.

The crowd wasn't expecting the pin to come this quickly, and it is rather anti climatic. Afterwards, Jumbo, the ref and everyone else in the ring are continually checking on Tenryu as this finish was obviously unexpected. I am not sure I have ever read anything in depth on what happened here, so I can only assume that this wasn't planned and the match ended prematurely. But the ending does indeed play into and add to the drama of what will unfold at their next encounter.

Unification Match 4 - Finally

Two days later, April 18, 1989 in the famous Ryōgoku Kokugikan, otherwise known as Sumo Hall, we finally get the titles unified. Once again the match is between NWA United National & PWF Champion Stan Hansen and NWA International Champion Jumbo Tsuruta.

Much like the first match, this bout features a fair amount of both wrestling and stiff chops and kicks. But in my view, tt is not as good a contest as their previous match, two days earlier. Certainly the ending makes it a historically significant contest, but all in all, it will pale in comparison to some of the later matches to come in the Triple Crown series, which rank in my view as the greatest matches of all time.

That is not to say this match is not good. One thing you notice quickly is that the ring is mic'ed very well so that every chop is heard clearly and loudly. The two were only going 18 minutes, so for that time they gave it everything they had. They hit each other hard and give us a stiff and fun match, even if somewhat lacks drama. Eventually, the two battle outside the ring where Hansen is able to bloody Tsuruta with hard elbows to the head. Following a chair shot, they are back in the ring where Hansen signals for the Lariat and the crows pops loudly to the gesture.

An interesting aside, Hansen noted in his autobiography that whenever he hit the lariat, he always ensured that was the finish of the match. His move is obviously over and the crows knows when he hits it, that is it. He hasn't "prostituted" his move to generate false finishes. So when he signals for the lariat, something not done in the first two matches of the series, the crowd pops huge thinking they finally get their payoff!

Well, he misses the lariat, bounces off the ropes, and Jumbo quickly roles him up for the win. The crowd gets their champion, but it was so quick and unexpected, that it really fails to draw much of a reaction. The crowd is in shock and Hansen quickly recovers and the post match may be better than any of the match itself with Hansen dropping elbows on Jumbo and beating up the All Japan staff that tries to come to the aid of Tsuruta.

So the three titles are now unified into the Triple Crown, setting the stage for the greatest series of wrestling matches in history!

Unification Match 3

Six months after their last attempt at unification, we once again have NWA United National & PWF Champion Stan Hansen and NWA International Champion Jumbo Tsuruta battling to unify the titles. The setting April 16, 1989 in Korakuen Hall.

This match is much more of a brawl than their last match. The moment the bell rings, the two are at it, and Jumbo gets in a fair amount of offense against Hansen. The highlight is perhaps a knee to Hansen's face off of the third rope. The match goes about 15 minutes and is almost entirely chops, kicks and chair shots. Frankly, I don't remember what went on between the two over the previous six months, but something must have, as these two battled non stop for the whole match, with little to no wrestling.

Eventually the two take it into the crowd with their fighting, using many of the ringside Korakuen chairs. This leads to a count out and to their famous rematch that occurs two days later. As in the first match, nothing is settled and the drama and build continues.

This is a fun match. It feels about the same as their last match, certainly not epic in scope, but more enjoyable and fun. By today's standard, a 15 minute main event is too short and the double count out is weak. And even then, both Jumbo and Hansen were capable of more. But as a part of the overall story, this is fine, even though short. And Hansen is certainly at his best when trading strikes instead of headlocks, which makes it slightly better than the first match.

Unification Match 2

Since the first attempt at unifying the titles, some changes have occurred. The new NWA United National & PWF Champion is Stan Hansen while the new NWA International Champion is Jumbo Tsuruta. So now on October 17, 1988, six months after the first unification match, we now have the new champions battling to unify the three titles.

I would love to tell you that this match is an all time classic. I would love to tell you that Hansen and Tsuruta, two of the all time greats, put on a match for the ages. I would love to tell you that this is a match you must see. Alas, I can not. If anything, this match is highly forgettable. Hansen and Tsurata work hard, wrestle some, brawl some and eventually end up out of the ring after a wild Hansen lariat. But as was the style then, both are counted out and nothing is settled in the way of the titles.

I can accept the count out as Baba was building the drama towards the match with true ending. And as noted, count outs were the norm at the time to protect the huge stars. But even though there is nothing wrong with this match in ring, it does only last 15 minutes and you never get the sense that you witnessed anything great. For AJPW, who for most of the 80's had incredible main events, this main event seems somewhat of a let down. The first match in the series with Brody and Tenyru was much better, longer and just felt better.