Burning vs. Hansen/Taue (AJPW - 12/3/1999)

On paper, Hansen/Taue looks almost as overpowering as Hansen/Vader. But the ravages of time have finally caught up with Hansen, and he’s actually a weak link for his team. He starts out hot, but he eventually becomes overwhelmed and needs Taue to save his bacon. He’s still plenty capable of doing damage, but it largely comes in the form of run-ins and double-teams. There’s a real poignancy to him struggling to hold his own in a strike battle with Akiyama when he would have squashed Akiyama like a bug in previous years. He’s such a sympathetic figure that Burning actually gets heel heat for double-teaming him and breaking up his tags. It thus falls on Taue to carry the load, and he’s practically a one-man wrecking crew. He single-handedly fights off both Burning members, counters Akiyama’s elbows with a double overhook suplex, and even cuts off Kobashi’s hot tag. The closing stretch starts out like a typical high-end All Japan tag. Hansen and Taue start going for their killshots, and Akiyama fights for his life to block them. It looks like it’ll only be a matter of time before he’s buried by the avalanche. But it ends up being a reprise of the 1998 RWTL final with Burning snatching victory from the jaws of defeat at the last minute. I’m so used to All Japan tags built around a team developing an insurmountable lead and never looking back that a sudden reversal of fortune really stands out. Having a move like Kobashi’s lariat that can be landed in the blink of an eye helps tremendously in that regard.