Anatomy of a Disaster: Shinya Hashimoto vs. Takao Omori

https://archive.org/details/2000-12-23-shinya-hashimoto-vs.-takao-omori

ANATOMY OF A DISASTER- SHINYA HASHIMOTO vs. TAKAO OMORI:
-It’s time for another Anatomy of a Disaster! This one comes by a request I got months ago, and I finally took a look at it. This match is a bit unlike the others, and one I was hesitant on, as I have no idea who the hell one of the competitors is, so all I can go on is what I’ve read about!

How much of a “Disaster” it is becomes a bit tricky, as the alleged fallout is bigger than the actual match itself, but you run into the usual problem with puro stuff- there’s just not much official information out there. Japan has very little history with “Shoot Interviews”, nor is there much of a culture of “talking shit about your former boss/coworkers”- even people who dislike each other are often vague in public, because it’s seen as EXTREMELY rude to do that. Which, if you know anything about Japanese culture, is unsurprising. I’ve done a lot of studying on it, because I’m a huge fucking weebI just really find foreign cultures interesting, and it’s just super-unlikely to find anyone giving major dirt.

I mean, the Japanese language ITSELF is evasive and indirect as a rule, such is the value put on cohabitation and not shaking the boat. Bilingual people have been told they come off as “more assertive” just by speaking English! Never mind that any of the official words on this situation would be in Japanese, which is a VERY hard language to translate, even if you knew how- which I don’t- said evasiveness often means you have to look for the meaning BEHIND the meaning- like how chotto means “a bit”, but ACTUALLY means “not really/no”, so if a hotel worker is telling you “chotto” when you ask if they have room, he’s actually telling you “no”, but he wouldn’t do that because it’s seen as a bit too rude and direct. Or when wrestlers fuck up a move and the commentator goes “chotto”- he meant the move hit “a bit”, but in context it means “He didn’t quite get ALL of it, Brain…”.

So you’re never gonna see a Takao Omori shoot where he goes “Misawa was an asshole! Hashimoto was an unprofessional prick!”, even if he thought those things were true. Even the “shoot” stuff involving Japan stuff that I HAVE seen and read about shows people being evasive not only about what happened, but who the assailants were. You’ll get a BIT of it, often only with decades of time removed and people admitting they should have handled it better and going “I regret that now”, but there’s few equivalents of the West’s “two hour ROH shoot interview of a guy burying everyone he hates”. Therefore, all you REALLY have to go on is guesswork and the actual facts.

But on to the match! Then I’ll look into the aftermath!

THE STAGE: NOAH Great Voyage 2000 (Dec. 23rd 2000)

THE PERFORMERS:
Shinya Hashimoto: Looking like a “Fat Japanese Elvis”, Hashimoto was actually a HUGE star for New Japan in the 1990s, and probably their most popular guy from that era. I had seen very little of his stuff until recently, but he won me over- his whole thing is this iron will, usually taking a beating but coming up with this intense, serious look on his face and just annihilating his opponent with stiff strikes. REALLY stiff. Despite his stardom in New Japan, he would be shuffled aside a bit, and had promised to leave New Japan if he lost again to rival Naoya Ogawa (a legit judo guy)- he did, losing in 2000. He then left New Japan (I have no idea the backstory behind the scenes here) and started up one of those infamous WACKY JAPANESE SPLINTER PROMOTIONS, heading up Pro Wrestling ZERO-ONE with Masato Tanaka & Shinjiro Ohtani.

Takao Omori: This dude looks like a greasy weirdo with badly dyed hair, haha. And… oh wait! I remember him now! He was in the WWF Royal Rumble as a “Token Foreigner” entry in 1996! Had the Orient Express music and everything! He didn’t do much, and got eliminated by Jake Roberts. Okay, so he debuted for All Japan Pro Wrestling in 1992, doing the mandatory “several years as a rookie” thing until he & Jun Akiyama (the top guy of the rookies) won the All Asia Tag Titles (the midcard belts, usually for teams going on to greater things, but not quite yet- Giant Baba was a notoriously slow-moving booker). He had formed NO FEAR with Yoshihiro Takayama and did a bit of stuff, then moved with Mitsuharu Misawa when he formed Pro Wrestling NOAH at the end of the millennium. Apparently he was highly thought of, as his team had split up and he was being set up against a star in a big Interpromotional Match on NOAH’s biggest card yet.

—

So this match is featuring Hashimoto, about to form ZERO-ONE (I think you’re supposed to capitalize all that) properly, against a NOAH upstart in Omori (who’s 31 years old). This was the new company NOAH’s biggest event yet- this match is going third last, meaning it’s probably a big deal- the only matches going after are Misawa vs. Vader and Kenta Kobashi vs. Jun Akiyama in the main. Though checking Cagematch (which I’ll be doing a lot here, being unfamiliar with Omori entirely), Omori usually only beats lower-end guys in singles before this, and jobbed to Kenta Kobashi in 10 minutes only a couple months earlier. Notably, Misawa is the President and booker of NOAH, and specifically the man it’s most important for Omori to impress.

SHINYA HASHIMOTO (Zero-One) vs. TAKAO OMORI:
* The crowd is pretty rabid for Hashimoto, who gets a lot of chants going in. Omori looks kind of greasy and middle-aged with simply terrible facial hair, but has a good build for his promotion (that puffy “all pecs” All Japan look) and his hair in a 1990s-style where it’s short and dark on the bottom and long, stringy and blond on top. He does a lot of pointing and tongue-wagging (Google Image Search confirms this is a regular thing for him). Hashimoto’s in the classic baggy black karate pants with the red stripes, and Omori’s in black trunks. The fans actually seem mostly on Omori’s side once the announcements are made, and they shake hands and start off.

It’s immediately a slapfest, as they crank on each other- Omori pulls off some European uppercuts to a great reaction but Hashimoto just WAFFLES him with an overhand chop, Omori using the momentum to bounce off the ropes and kick him in the face. Love that shit. They keep firing off moves like that, but repeat the “overhand to boot” spot but with a lot less velocity and clinch up (Omori’s probably like “Jesus Christ! Did I run over your dog or something?”) and they tangle up and hit the mat in the ropes in a super-awkward bit that seems like they’re disagreeing about something. Back up, they do a snug lockup into a headlock by Hashimoto, fighting Omori to the mat and throwing some throat-thrusts, to BOOS! A slam & elbow follow that, and Omori waggles his tongue a bit, but suddenly gets a serious look as he’s pulled up by the hair, and Hashimoto dares him to do another chopfest. And that goes badly for Omori, as his overhand chops to the chest are completely ignored, Hashimoto demanding he hit HARDER, then puts him into the ropes and swats away with some live rounds, chops him on the back of the neck, then cranks him with a big left kick to the chest. Oh that felt pretty stiff. Omori is saying something as he crumples down.

Omori stays there for a bit, delaying, and finally Hashimoto comes in again for another snug lockup, pushing him into the corner and grabbing the hair- the ref tries to get between them, and Omori pops up onto the turnbuckles to get a cheap-shot in, drawing a good reaction. An infuriated Hashimoto comes in for some brutal chest-kicks to batter him around, a head kick (this one is noticeably lighter than the others, as it’d be an unsafe shot otherwise- it whiffs but is sold, as these shots typically are), then another stiff chest-kick. Omori flat-backs and sells death, and can’t even be pulled up for more punishment- the ref holds Hashimoto off and starts the count, but Hash starts throwing stomps to interrupt it. Omori finally gets to his knees but is cracked by another big chest-kick, then another, never answering any of them with defiance or offense- this is just an execution. Finally… FINALLY… Omori manages something as Hash picks him up for the Brainbuster (his finisher) and gets bullrushed into the corner, selling his arm! And the crowd EXPLODES at this, eager to see their “home promotion” boy get his comeback!

Omori finally manages some offense, hitting a big lariat in the corner- Hashimoto looks defiant, but pained, stalking out and being floored by another charging lariat, which gets two. Omori manages a Dragon Suplex on the fat guy (impressive to be able to manage a bridge on that, though it was a twisting one), getting the same count. Omori makes some stupid faces and points to his lariating arm and charges in again, but Hashimoto fires off an overhand chop to the BICEP to counter it, then hits a backfist- a head kick puts Omori down, and he hauls him up for the Brainbuster at (6:34), pinning Omori in less than seven minutes!

So, uh… yeah. Basically 6 minutes for the “Third From The Top” match on NOAH’s biggest card yet. That really speaks to how bizarre this quick ending might have been. The main, mind you, was 36 minutes long! Misawa/Vader went 14 as well. To be fair, the Takayama vs. Akira Taue match preceding it was only 7-ish minutes, but still.

As a match, it was a “can you top this?” strike-war (the same thing you see weekly on AEW today) leading to Hashimoto bludgeoning his opponent half to death, followed by a three-move comeback by Omori… and that was it. Hashimoto then scores a bunch of unanswered shots and makes his opponent look like a jobber who never got close to a chance. It’s pretty weak and basic, but inoffensive… except it’s so high on the card and an interpromotional match (often a big deal), so in this kind of slot you’d have expected the upstart to pull off all his best stuff, get a lot of offense, the veteran to trick the fans into thinking he had a chance with some near-falls, etc.- instead, Hashimoto just kills him and makes sure we know it was never close. Omori comes off as kind of a wimp.

Rating: ** (a borderline squash, if a very stiff one- Omori never looked like he had a chance, getting only three moves of any substance)

The Fallout: So NOW we get to why this is called a “Disaster” by some. Repercussions for this were allegedly huge.

Per Wikipedia:
For an undisclosed reason, Omori called for an early ending to his singles bout with Shinya Hashimoto in the middle of their singles match at Noah’s Great Voyage 2000 event, which was the company’s most important event up to that point. Because of this, Omori was immediately in Misawa’s doghouse, and after the NO FEAR team broke up (so Takayama could pursue mixed martial arts matches) Omori was sent abroad to Harley Race’s World League Wrestling promotion in the American Midwest, where he won the company’s heavyweight title. During his excursion, Misawa continued to deny that Omori had been sent abroad by Noah, and Omori was not welcomed back to Noah when he returned from the excursion. As a result, Omori joined Fighting World of Japan Pro Wrestling, where he feuded with Riki Choshu, Genichiro Tenryu and Kensuke Sasaki.

Omori is said to have “called for an early ending” to the bout (apparently due to the stiffness, though obviously he wouldn’t admit to that publicly so it’s mostly guesswork and hearsay), and ending up in Misawa’s doghouse as a result. Misawa being the boss, booker and founder of NOAH, you can see how this would be a problem. HOWEVER, while I’m reading tons of stuff from Americans about how disastrous this was to Omori’s career, I can see that he wrestled for NOAH another TWO YEARS, leaving for ZERO-ONE thereafter. Like, he actually goes 50/50 for the year, and wins matches against plenty of people- young Naomichi Marufuji and guys like that, plus he & Takayama beats teams featuring Misawa himself on a decent keel, even winning the GHC Tag Belts at the end of 2001! They lose them a few months later, but still. NO FEAR remain a team with lots of wins until mid-2002.

Omori’s team split up and Omori suddenly moves to the US for a while, wrestling for Harley Race’s World League Wrestling promotion in the American Midwest (translation: he vanished off the face of the Earth) while Misawa allegedly denied he had been sent abroad by NOAH… and then Omori wasn’t welcomed back when he was done with WLW. He was even one of NWA Champion Ken Shamrock’s first opponents in NWA-TNA! Omori joined Fighting World of Japan Pro Wrestling, which was… *sigh*… ANOTHER Wacky Japanese Splinter Promotion, this one created by Riki Choshu and Katsuji Nagashima. It only lasted a couple years. And so Omori actually joined ZERO-ONE– the very same company Hashimoto wrestled for, and wrestled against him in numerous matches! He left for New Japan in 2009-10, semi-retired, and then returned to All Japan in 2011, where he’s wrestled as “just some guy” ever since. He has appeared on only three NOAH cards, near as I can tell, reuniting NO FEAR against Jun Akiyama once and doing a couple other tag matches.

From what I’ve read, this match is seen by many as the end of Omori’s potential- like he was being groomed for a potential main event slot, but instead screwed it all up and vanished, becoming “just one of those guys” thereafter. HOWEVER, just looking at Cagematch, he wins a bunch and his team is still around, so if he’s in the doghouse, it’s not a particularly vicious one. Like, to read the Wikipedia or Wrestling Fandom bios on him, you’d think he did this match and was turfed right away, but that’s not what happened at all, to the point where I’d imagine a lot of Western fans just took the story or assumptions and ran with it. This happens a LOT with puro, as people read something Meltzer wrote and “telephone game” it in to god knows what.

However, Omori’s career is pretty mediocre- he won belts here and there, but his big wins are things like “beat Steve Corino for a belt you’ve never heard of”, not “fought Misawa in the main event” or something cool like that. He still wrestles a LOT (even in the past five years, he typically has 60-120 matches per year!), but he’s just one of those filler guys. His biggest thing was probably winning the famous Triple Crown in 2014, scoring the vacant belt, but lost it in only 14 days.

BUT, again, finding the truth about the whole thing is elusive- no one’s gonna be doing shoot promos in Japanese about this situation, and even if they did, they’d be elusive enough with the facts, and be difficult to translate into English. If I had to GUESS, I’d say that match caused Misawa to lose faith in him as a tough guy who had what it took to “make it”, and probably netted him a subtle “doghouse” position, while not directly squashing him, then cutting him loose after a year and a half (maybe just not renewing his contract?). The circumstances of him leaving NOAH are certainly a bit odd, with nobody indicating anything and generally being evasive, which is usually Japanese for “we don’t want to talk about it and aren’t going to spread rumors that rock the boat or make anyone look bad” in my experience.

Mitigating Factors: Well if Hashimoto WAS being overly stiff, I can buy Omori backing down or lightening it up (he could have mentioned something in their pair of clinches, especially the weird ugly one where they tumble to the mat like there’s an actual scrap or a miscommunication going on). Generally if you think your opponent’s about to kill you, you’re justified in wanting out of there, too.

Looking at the evidence (ie. what I can actually see here), Hashimoto was definitely firing shots at him, but not exactly bigger than normal. Like, his whole THING is “throws stiff shots”. I note that most of his kicks don’t make that “smack!” sound unless he’s got both hands free (ie. he’s probably slapping his own chest or thigh on impact), as when he’s propping himself up using the ropes, the kick doesn’t make any noise, so it’s not like they’re all live rounds. Omori appears to pretty quickly de-escalate the stiffness and soften it up a lot, probably on purpose. There’s a bit of communication in the grapples and Omori pretty much stops fighting back (or provoking Hashimoto to ramp it up again) until it’s time for his comeback, and then Hashimoto stops it right quick and finishes him.

Overall: Honestly, if Omori DID call an early ending due to the stiffness, he probably had what was coming to him. This could have been a decent war and showcase for him as a rising star, but instead made him look pretty weak and like a goon lined up for the killshot. And really, it’s hard to be surprised that HASHIMOTO would be stiff with someone. Never mind that Omori came up in All Japan & NOAH, with an infamously stiff style. This is one of those things where the legend of the match might be more than it’s ramped up to be, and fans just kinda repeated rumors as fact for years, but those involved are unlikely to ever be up-front about it, so like with a lot of puro stuff, it’s really a mystery. So a “Hey, maybe!” is the best I can do as to the veracity of this match’s reputation!