Kobashi/Shiozaki vs Sasaki/Nakajima (NOAH 11/05/2005)

I'd long held off on rewatching this as I always thought that there was just no way it could possibly live up to how I experienced it on first viewing, but somehow it actually did mostly live up to it. Fantastic workrate tag that is top 3 minimum for 21st century, if not the best. The blistering pace, hard exchanges, and crowd are all top notch, but what puts it in that top tier is the hierarchy-based psychology holding it together. I actually prefer Kobashi and Sasaki's stuff here as it's much more interesting watching them try to balance their own pride with having to preserve themselves enough to support their rookie, compared to the Dome match being a more straight-forward bombs match. Nuts seeing Sasaki eat Kobashi's chops without even budging an inch, his chest progressively swelling and turning purple over the course of the match made for some great visuals. Nakajima and Shiozaki also look incredible here for their experience working lots of impressive exchanges with ridiculous speed behind them. Can't imagine a teenager delivering a better performance than Nakajima does here. The sub-text of the rookies progressively gaining importance in the match as their senior get tired out is executed to perfection, especially seeing Shiozaki slowly gaining confidence. The suplex exchange in the middle with Shiozaki standing tall was the highlight for me. Amazing bump on that final lariat as well. It's the kind of match that fills me with optimism for the future of puro, even knowing that this match happened nearly 20 years ago and neither rookie really lived up to their senior.

Watched Nakajima/Kondo 2/2007 after this and it was a standard 2.9 fest with time killing matwork and blown off limb work that had me wondering if I still liked wrestling. Smile and optimism gone.