Mitsuharu Misawa vs. Kenta Kobashi (AJPW - 10/21/1997)

I underrated the fuck out of this match before. It's probably the "worst" Kobashi/Misawa world title match, but that just speaks to absolutely insane quality of their series and it would still be a career match with virtually any other pairing out there.

Main thing driving this match is the absolutely brutal neck work on Misawa, who is amazing in selling every bit of it. He eats an insane amount of punishment in the form of head drops and nasty neck holds, and there's points where it seems crazy that he can keep going. Plenty of excellent cut-off spots as well with Kobashi going for neck chops whenever Misawa starts getting something going, and there's some really compelling neck chop vs. elbow exchanges as well. When Misawa finally comes back on offense, he's unloading with all kinds of hard elbow shots that can be heard all around the arena. Hot crowd as well for it, and I've mentioned it before but there's a woman in the front row with some awesome reactions, especially during the finish.

I thought the control segments were actually really smartly worked. It's taken me a long time to see it, but I think I finally get what MJH was on about when he said this match had a "mirrors" structure to it. If you pay attention, you can see both guys drawing from the others' playbook to try to take the advantage. Misawa does an elbow suicida, Kobashi does his own plancha, and then Misawa shows him how it's done with his own elbow plancha. Also, Misawa goes for his signature facelock and Kobashi follows up with all sorts of unusual neck holds, culminating in his own attempt at a face lock. More subtley, you also have Misawa pulling out the Tiger Suplex 85 late in the match after eating several sleeper suplexes from Kobashi, and there's a real "here's how you do it, fucker" vibe to it with how similar the moves are. It's all really tastefully done and comes across more like these guys are so familiar with each other that each other that their movesets are seeping into each other. Also, I love the spot they did towards the end where they worked a double knock-down off Kobashi hitting a running lariat at the same time as Misawa hit a running elbow.

In addition, the match builds nicely off of their January title match. Early on, you have Kobashi going for a powerbomb on the outside that again gets countered into a hurricanrana, which he even sells similarly to how he did the spot in the January match. The big call-backs are in the finish stretch, though, between Misawa's running elbow, Kobashi finally hitting the lariat that he couldn't hit cleanly in January, and Misawa finishing things with a Tiger Driver 91 to re-establish it as a killer.

Beneath all this, there's a pretty compelling undertone with the match in some ways serving as a mediation of what these wrestlers put themselves through to entertain the fans. Kobashi pulled his left thigh muscle going into this match, but he tries his best to work through it. He talks in the interview before the match about how important it is to him to live up to fans' expectations and give them a good match no matter what. He wrestles like it's not even there at the start, but it slowly becomes harder to ignore for him and eventually you really can feel how he's in some extreme pain working a match like this. Meanwhile, you have Misawa going for his 2nd defense of the month with his usual neck problems, which Kobashi takes advantage of for his match strategy, and Misawa sells it masterfully as mentioned. By the end, both guys look like they've been through a car wreck and are incapable of standing on their own. Fittingly, all this is taking place in the main event of the promotion's 25th anniversary, these two wounded warriors serving as representatives of what the promotion is about.

All that said, I still think it's ridiculous for this to win Tokyo Sports MOTY over their January match, but I can see the thought process. It's a match that encompasses the beautiful and the ugly aspects of the promotion and rewards close viewing, while also being worked on the promotion's biggest stage.

After their classic bout in January, this was a must see rematch. And like the Janarury match, Kobashi’s primary focus was attacking Misawa’s neck, first going to the suplexes quickly before settling on dropkicks and submissions before escalating to something big when the time was right. Misawa was very resourceful at times, even attacking Kobashi’s knee after landing feet first after a failed suplex to the outside. I like how Kobashi wrestles in this match most of all. Of course, his offence is brilliantly executed, as always, but he is quick to regain the advantage if something doesn’t go right. He wrestles like he wants the title; needs it even. Misawa is strong in his role. He is always fighting and struggling to win, slowly getting more and more as the match goes on, while doing a great job of making Kobashi be seen as on his level. Misawa can’t pull off a Tiger Driver as easily as he does in a lot of matches, he has to work for it much more in this match, and when does hit it, he has to hit a Tiger Suplex and a rolling elbow before it. Kobashi kicks out nonetheless, kicking out of the following running elbow which has won Misawa the title before. And by this point, they have the crowd rocking with each nearfall and they end the match with a few more great sequences, which include some gross elbow strikes from Misawa and a final Tiger Driver 91 to win. Great match. It’s unfair to compare it to a classic match but this is a step down from that in terms of creating some transcendent wrestling sequences. However it does exactly what it needs to, it gives Kobashi yet another main event establishing performance in front of a sold hot, red hot crowd. ****1/4