WAR Wrestle Association-R 7th Anniversary Show 06/20/99
By Maffew Gregg on 16 February 2025
Wrestle Association-R
Korakuen Hall
Attendance: 2,100 (sold out)
Main event features Onita and Tenryu teaming together, which is a surprise considering they hate each other.
Tokyo Sports, which is a somewhat sensationalistic sports newspaper, ran a story on 1/19 that Genichiro Tenryu and Atsushi Onita had buried the hatchet after a meeting on 1/17 at Tenryu’s restaurant. The heat stemmed from a show on March 26, 1995 when Onita originally booked Tarzan Goto to appear in a main event on Tenryu’s WAR promotion, but then double-booked him and Goto no-showed the date. It was a real big deal at the time and killed business relations between the two groups, which at the time were drawing some big money with Tenryu vs. Onita, one match of which drew 52,000 fans. Onita will be promoting his own USO promotion shows on 3/5 in Nagasaki and 3/7 at Korakuen Hall. It’s speculated that New Japan may put Tenryu & Onita together as a tag team, which makes booking sense since Onita does have the name, and Tenryu can carry the match
Tape opens up with footage from Tenryu and Onita’s previous bouts in 1994, cruelly reminding us they sold out Kawasaki Stadium five years ago and tonight they’re barely able to pack Korakuen Hall.
Masao Orihara vs. Tomohiro Ishii
At least these guys have history from when they were battling over the WAR Light Heavyweight Tag Titles. Ishii currently holds one half of them, but more on those later on.
Orihara wastes no time sending Ishii outside and yelling loudly, so Ishii sends him into a pile of fans-dressed-as-chairs. Ishii even follows with an ungainly top rope swanton to the outside, squishing Orihara’s legs in the process.
We clip to Orihara smashing Ishii with a Palm Strike before parading him around with a Piledriver by rotating in all four directions with the crowd cheering him to turn their way.
We clip further to Orihara’s moonsault (not that one) meeting knees, with a follow-up diving headbutt failing to put the mad one away. A trio of sit-out Brainbusters looks to finish but Ishii is mad-mad and picks Orihara up at two. Orihara is able to recover and spike Ishii with a Spider German Suplex, holding onto the ropes and connecting with the moonsault…for two. Orihara checks with the ref, leading to a low blow from Ishii to set up a small package from Orihara to end it at 12:09 after some confirming with the ref.
What a sweet little match! I prefer Orihara in his evil goatee stage of life as he’s much better at getting a reaction from the crowd by being an arsehole.
Koki Kitahara vs. Ni Hao
This is supposed to look real I guess as both men are wearing gloves. Kitahara was convinced he could do shoot style because he was a fat guy that could throw kicks. Mate you’re not Hashimoto, you’re Tomas Brolin.
This is mega clipped until Koki SMASHES Hao in the face with a massive kick…
…before immediately dropping him on an attempted powerbomb. Because when you need your opponent to assist you with a move, it’s best to knock them silly first. Koki does it again, Hao reverses so Koki rolls into an ankle pick submission at 6:05. Whatever.
Ryuma Go vs. Thunder Warrior Alpha
Go is booked and is again wrestling weird masked gimmicks. His opponent takes out his frustrations on not having a CageMatch profile by smashing the seat of a chair over Go’s head. Go yells and applies the Dragon Sleeper at 7:42. Ryuma Go Fuck Yourself.
Genichiro Tenryu & Magnum Tokyo vs. Nobutaka Araya & Sumo Fuji
Tenryu working double duty, probably due to a lack of people able to fill the card. You know this one is going to be good because Magnum Tokyo strips his gear but it lands on Tenryu.
Tokyo starts off but Fuji wants Tenryu. He politely declines until Fuji assumes the sumo position and THAT motivates Tenryu into tagging in. Fuji tries the sumo slap charge but Tenryu ignores it before chopping Fuji to the mat. Fuji is able to send Tenryu outside thanks to a dreaded eye rake, before getting sent into empty chairs. Araya uses this distraction to lariat Tenryu on the outside. Magnum lands a sexy Frankensteiner complete with hip gyrations. Crowd adore Magnum, they must have been getting those hot WCW Thunder tapes. Odd that Araya is in this half-comedy match considering he was supposed to be a near-headliner by this point. Everyone but Tenryu brawls to the backstage area where Magnum Twink gets sent into a wall. We’re doing a lot of brawling and hardcore considering what the main event is.
Tokyo takes a Brainbuster and finally Tenryu bothers to help his kinda-friend by landing an Enziguri over the ropes at Araya. Magnum is able to land a loud flying headscissors to send Araya outside and kinda land an Asai Moonsault. Fuji comes in instead to work over Tokyo and taunt Tenryu by dangling Magnum’s arm in his direction. Fuji eventually messes around too much and lets Tokyo get the hot tag to Tenryu who cleans house in a non-fun serious manner. Crowd aren’t into it as much after Tokyo’s antics, so Tenryu tags him back in to in-ring Asai Moonsault Fuji. La Magistral is kicked out of so Fuji goes low to regain the advantage. Araya again works over Tokyo with big Brainbusters which regains the crowd’s attention, with Tenryu saving Magnum from losing to a moonsault. Tenryu hot tags in again to level Araya until Fuji knees Tenryu on a charge. Fuji makes the mistake of tagging in and trying to knock down Tenryu with lariats. All he does is make him blink, causing Fuji to get smited and Tokyo to land an impressive Shooting Star Press at 15:35 for the victory.
Match may have gone on longer than it needed to but the crowd were going CRAZY over Magnum when he was being worked over. Plus it’s better to have this go long than have some of the other rubbish wrestlers go longer.
Speaking of which:
Arashi & Osamu Tachihikari vs. Daikokubo Benkei & Ichiro Yaguchi
We’re JIP to Osamu trying a La Magistral for two as the Mexican Gods (Quetzalcoatl, Dr. Wagner Jr. & Bumblebee Man) weep. As Osamu slowly sends Benkei into the ringside chairs to loud laughter, Arashi wins after a lovely Frog Splash to end an amazingly clipped 12:42.
Let’s make like the wrestlers and slowly move on.
Naohiro Hoshikawa & Super Delfin vs. Masaaki Mochizuki & Yuji Yasuraoka
Yuji and Delfin start and feel each other out in a respectful way until the other two lads tag in to try knocking the other out early. Mochizuki’s kicks sound like gunfire, even in the opening minutes. Yuji lands the Super High Crossbody on Delfin early to tease a count-out. Delfin tags in Hoshikawa who probably wishes he didn’t after taking more of Mochizuki’s stiff kicks to the back. Delfin headbutts Yuji as I wonder if his pointy nose adds damage to those attacks. Like getting hit with a box cutter. Mochizuki again kicks Hoshikawa hard who finally gets the advantage…for two seconds before he tags in Yuji to double suplex him.
Hoshikawa locks in a Kimura which succeeds in getting the women screeching for him so well done. Delfin and Hoshikawa manage a Hart Attack variant with a high-arse dropkick from the dolphin. Delfin holds Yuji open as Hoshikawa mocks the women’s noises as he kicks him in the chest. Yuji starts taking German Suplexes and Mochizuki has to save the little lad which only encourages the crowd to cheer louder for him. Mochizuki’s pop is impressive because it means lots of kicks. Mochizuki wipes out everybody and lands on his feet from a German Suplex, lands a high kick to the face, nails Hoshikawa with the spinning springboard kick off the top and connects with a German Suplex. Christ. Delfin stops it from ending the match because that would have been too cool. Yuji also can’t pin Delfin with the La Magistral so Hoshikawa & Mochizuki brawl outside so Yuji finishes Delfin with a top rope DDT.
Oh wait, no he doesn’t as Hoshikawa breaks it up causing another ringside brawl. Delfin very nearly puts away Yuji with a schoolboy roll-up and a big-arse DDT. Tornado DDT looks to finish, but Mochizuki flies off the top outta nowhere with a lovely top rope dropkick to interrupt that. Hoshikawa then lands a huge log of a vaulting kick off the top to the back of Yuji’s head, to set up a Delfin Palm Strike and a Delfin Clutch ends it 17:39. Decent and spirited match here.
Mochizuki mouths off at Yuji afterwards, setting up an impromptu match between the two.
Masaaki Mochizuki vs. Yuji Yasuraoka
Yuji accepts by landing The High Ass Crossbody to the outside while he’s still walking to the ring. Yuji lands HIS version of the springboard kick that Mochizuki borrowed but he can’t win with it. Yuji runs right into a high kick which enables Mochizuki to land his version of the springboard kick (with flip!) to set up another near-fall. Crowd are enthusiastically behind the match, with neither man getting more cheering. Finally though, both men slap each other at the same time with neither conceding until Mochizuki runs into another brutal sounding high kick to end his career at 4:31 doing what he loved, which was getting smashed in the face.
Yuji retiring is surprising but also not surprising. He took hellish beatings in his rise up the card and may have beaten the likes of Liger, Samurai and Orihara but he only ended up making a dent in WAR. With the company existing less and less, you can see how that would make him reconsider his life choices.
Yuji would retire and take his half of the Light Heavyweight Tag Titles with him. The titles would be dormant until Dragon Gate re-activated them in 2006.
Street Fight Tornado Death
Genichiro Tenryu & Nobutaka Araya & Shoji Nakamaki vs. Atsushi Onita & Sambo Asako & Takashi Okamura
Everyone heads outside for the big ol’ brawl, only the fourth of the night so far. Onita’s involved so the crowd is REALLY into it. Onita & Tenryu become a blur as the cameraman struggles to keep up with them, with Tenryu eventually appearing as he smashes head-first into the side of the hall. In the ring, poor Sambo is taking chair shots and even in 1999 he looks fucked. Tenryu bashes a chair on him until he bleeds before Onita smashes Araya’s face into the other side of the hall. Crowd are still crazy loud for this despite the lack of visibility. Sambo manages a swinging leg kick to pathetic that Tenryu simply stamps his feet knocks him down again. Nakamaki gets sent into one side of the hall before Onita takes him to the other, unlocks a particular hard achievement Onita had been trying to get for a while.
Okamura thankfully heads into the ring to give Sambo a lie down. Tenryu ignores everything Sambo does to head outside to throw chairs. After getting his steps in for the day, Onita returns to get punched by Tenryu. Onita is able to DDT Tenryu which was very generous of him. Onita chokes Tenryu as Nakamaki brings a load of chairs into the ring, with fans helping him out and getting a handshake in appreciation. Tenryu takes a spike piledriver onto a pile of chairs for two as this is approaching something resembling order. Onita hates that and piledrives Nakamaki on the outside for the hell of it. Tenryu is stuck inside the ring throwing chairs at anybody near him while Onita is DDTing people on the floor. Finally Onita returns to the ring to take hard chops from Mr. Wrestling. Okamura manages a moonsault onto Tenryu without landing on one of the two dozen chairs, which gets him a lariat and powerbomb for his reward. Sambo somehow makes the save by running over Tenryu which he doesn’t appreciate so Sambo takes his 99th chair shot. Tenryu yells “ALRIGHT FUCK YOU” while landing a Blind Elbow on Okamura which is exactly when Onita returns to lariat Tenryu. He buggers off immediately, deciding it’s best to attack Tenryu when he’s completely defenceless. So Okamura ends up taking another lariat but when Onita tries to save, Nakamaki holds him from outside the ring to prevent a save to end it at 12:52 Eh, it’s an Onita brawl and they all blend together after a while. At least the crowd was happy.
Onita goes to shake Tenryu’s hand afterwards before pulling it away, so Tenryu says a few words before thanking everyone for showing up.
Tenryu and Onita would have many more multi-man brawl matches like this, drawing best when they wrestled for Onita’s companies like Onita Pro and Project X. Everyone else waited until Tenryu was having proper matches.
Overall: Plenty of fun stuff here to enjoy but this really was Just A Show That Happened rather than attempting to build anything for WAR’s future (what little it had):
To show how much you can trust indie attendance figures in Japan, the 3/20 WAR show in Matsumoto headlined by Tenryu retaining his J-1 Rikidozan title beating Nobutaka Araya was listed in the newspapers as drawing 2,800 fans when the real number was 400
Speaking of numbers:
73 shows in 1995
62 shows in 1996
45 shows in 1997
29 shows in 1998
9 shows in 1999
1 show in 2000
It’s finally time for the final show next week.
