Super-J Cup and All Japan PPV results

Marufuji Wins Super-J Cup: The 4th Stage
Yesterday, Osaka-Pro hosted the 4th ever Super-J Cup tournament at the Osaka Castle Hall. Representatives from every fed in Japan took part in the show. However, the show was still considered a failure by many as the announced attendance was only 6,800 in a venue that could house 16,000! And the eye-witness accounts say the actual attendace numbers may be even lower, around the 5,000 range. Another complaint many had was that the length of the matches just seemed to fly by, with most matches not even making the 10-minute mark.

The first round of the tournament kicked off with Pro-Wrestling NOAH's Naomichi Marufuji defeating ZERO-ONE's Jun Kasai with the Shiranui. Garuda of Hayabusa's WMF promotion than defeated Osaka-Pro's Goa with a huricanrana. New Japan's Wataru Inoue beat Michinoku Pro's Kazuya Yuasa with an Octopus hold submission, and in the last quarterfinal, Osaka-Pro's Takehiro Murahama defeated All Japan's Taichi Ishikari with a brainbuster.

Non-tournament matches before the next round saw K-Dojo's Ofune beat fellow K-Dojo-mate Apple Miyuki with a front neck lock, Tomohiro Ishii (WJ), MEN's Teoh (BJW) & MIKAMI (DDT) beat Kintaro Kanemura (WEW - Is this guy really a Jr Heavy?!?), Big Boss MA-G-MA (OPro) & Azteca when Ishii used a brainbuster on Azteca, and Kuishinbo Kamen defeated his eternal rival Ebessan for the unofficial World's No.1 title with the Kankuu Tornado. The big announcement was made after that they would have their rematch in America at NWA:TNA's 3/3 PPV!

The second round of the tournament began with Naomichi Marufuji advancing after defeating Garuda with a modified cradle and his opponent in the finals would be Takehiro Murahama who scored his win over Wataru Inoue with his brainbuster finisher.

Before the finals, Billy Ken Kid & Tigers Mask successfully made their V2 defence of the Osaka-Pro tag team titles as they defeated the team of TAKA Michinoku (K-Dojo) & Shiryu (Kaz Hayashi - AJPW), in what was considered an upset when BKK pinned TAKA with a backslide.
Next was the big young generation vs old generation 6-man tag. The young gen team lead by NJPW's IWGP Jr. champion Heat, with NOAH's KENTA & Toryumon's CIMA defeated the veteran team of GHC Jr. champion Jushin Thunder Liger (NJPW), Jinsei Shinzaki (MPro) & Super Delphin (OPro) when CIMA pinned Delphin following his Schwein finisher. This was the longest match of the night at just 16 minutes.

Next came the big finals. Naomichi Marufuji won the tournament beating Murahama with an avalanche-style Shiranui after Murahama had kicked out of a regular Shiranui. Marufuji was awarded a golden jacket and prize money. Overall, the show was said to be good by indy-standards, but a failure by Super-J Cup standards, due to the lack of any big names in the actual tournament itself as they were trying to push the younger generation of workers. Also absent were any foreign workers in the tournament and the fact that with the exception of Garuda, non of the participants were true high-flyers.

All Japan Nippon Budokan PPV Results
This is one All Japan show I'll definately be getting a tape of! This is also said to be the last All Japan show ever to be held at the Budokan 'till next year's Giant Baba Memorial Show, as the company is trying to cut back it's expenses by booking smaller venues. The company has been running shows in the building since 1975, so this is one of the last ties to All Japan's history that is being killed off. This show was said to be a super no vacancy sellout of 16,000 attendance.

1. Abdullah the Butcher, Ebedullah Buchan, & Yaz Urano defeated Shigeo Okumura, Gran Hamada, & Taichi Ishikari in 11:58 when Butcher pinned Ishikari after an elbow drop.

2. Ryuji Hijikata & Nobukazu Hirai defeated Nobutaka Araya & Hideki Hosaka in 9:08 when Hijikata used a Fisherman Suplex Hold on Hosaka for the win.

3. TAKA Michinoku, The Gladiator & Bull Buchanan defeated Arashi, Hi69 & Masayuki Kono in 12:09 when Gladiator pinned HI69 with a flying bodypress.

4. Hardcore Tag Match: Tomoaki Honma & Kazushi Miyamoto defeated NOSAWA & MAZADA in 12:27 when Honda pinned NOSAWA following the Shalimarti.

5. Genichiro Tenryu defeated Masanobu Fuchi in 10:43 with a powerbomb.

6. World Jr. Title Match: Kaz Hayashi defeated BLUE-K (TAKA Michinoku) in 14:31 with the Final Cut to become the 21st Champion. Hayashi is now a triple title holder as he also holds the world tag team titles with Kojima and All Asian Tag Titles under the gimmick of Shiryu, also partnered with Kojima under his Great Kosuke gimmick.

7. Taiyo Kea defeated Satoshi Kojima in 19:23 with the Hawaiian Smasher.

8. Keiji Mutoh & Bob Sapp defeated Jamal & D-Lo Brown in 15:05 when Mutoh pinned D-Lo after the Shining Impact.

9. Triple Crown: Toshiaki Kawada defeated Shinya Hashimoto in 19:57 by TKO when ZERO-ONE manager Nakamura threw in the towel after Kawada put Hashimoto in the Stretch Plumb. This was not the finish I was hoping for, but sounds like a good match. I guess this now makes them even as Kawada once had the towel thrown in for him during a tag match with Mutoh VS Hashimoto & Naoya Ogawa at the ZERO-ONE 5/5/03 show. Hopefully we get another match out of these guys with a proper finish.

Credit to Strong Style Spirit and Puroresu Power for the results.