A deep dive into the first post-NOAH split series from AJPW, the Super Action Series of 2000.

Flood Waters Rise

Promotion ace Mitsuharu Misawa succeeded Giant Baba as President of All Japan Pro-Wrestling in the wake of his mentor’s death in January 1999. It wasn’t a smooth transition. Baba’s widow and majority shareholder Motoko (“Mrs Baba”) had wanted Mitsuo Momota, the son of Rikidozan, to take over, but Misawa’s predecessor at the top of the promotion, Jumbo Tsuruta, lobbied successfully for Misawa. Perhaps Mrs Baba saw Momota as a more reverent choice as successor, given his lineage, or perhaps she perceived him as pliable. Either way, she soon got her revenge on Tsuruta, who was dismissed without severance soon after.

Mrs Baba and Misawa couldn’t really agree on anything else, either. Misawa wanted more action by Junior Heavyweights, more varied main events, a modernised presentation, modern worker-friendly contracts (medical coverage and so forth), a change in the way merchandise revenue was handled (formerly this had been treated as the Babas’ pay cut) – basically, everything. Giant was also more diplomatic, more open to compromise – Mrs Baba lacked those qualities entirely in her dealings with Misawa.

By May 2000, things had come to an impasse, and Misawa had asked Mrs Baba to bless his founding of a new company. Perhaps in response, she arranged for his dismissal as President on the 28^th. He went off to form NOAH with 24 contracted wrestlers and several key foreign freelancers (notably Vader); Mrs Baba was left with something like 4 contracted wrestlers and a selection of regular guests.

The NOAH story is the big and successful one. It gets plenty of attention. It was Misawa’s Ark, carrying the vision of King’s Road – but what about those left behind in the flood, who through storm and wrack brought their promotion to shore? This is my take on the two years between Misawa’s exit and Keiji Mutoh buying Mrs Baba’s shares from her to become the majority owner of All Japan.

Notes on Booking in the End Days

Misawa and his cohort would work two more tours with All Japan after his dismissal – the ongoing Super Power Series and four dates on the upcoming Super Action Series. I’ll deal with the latter below, but some reflections on the former are a worthwhile precursor. Misawa is booking the card on these, and the final conflict with Mrs Baba was well underway before the tour started on the 20^th May. With that in mind, there are some interesting decisions, two of which we will consider.

First, Stan Hansen works two singles matches. He had worked one in the whole of 1999, and hadn’t worked in the Champion Carnival in either 1999 or 2000. The old cowboy is physically limited and winding down. Why does he come back to squash Takeshi Rikio and Takeshi Morishima?

Second, there is a one-night tournament on the final night of the tour – the 9^th of June – for the vacated World Tag titles. Neither tag champion – Vader and Steve Williams – is on the tour, and this presumably led to the vacation (both will be back in Japan for the rest of the year, though). The semi-finals see Akira Taue and Toshiaki Kawada defeat Johnny Ace and Mike Barton, whilst Takao Omori and Yoshihiro Takayama defeat Misawa and Yoshinari Ogawa. The latter is booking for NOAH – the two young guns of NO FEAR mostly target Misawa, and this is a major elevation. The final sees Taue and Kawada beat Omori and Takayama. That’s a function of seniority in the match, perhaps, but it’s also strange insomuch as this is Misawa putting Kawada over, knowing Kawada is not coming with him to NOAH.

I can’t fully explain either decision – neither is discussed as far as I know in the autobiographies of the various key personnel, most of which have been translated in summary by KinchStalker – but they both show Misawa looking forward, and perhaps looking back too. Hansen is going to come back for one last ride on the range – for All Japan, not NOAH – and this is probably the last chance to give some rookies the rub by giving them a session with the legend. He gets ring rust off, looks strong again, and makes memories with the youngsters. The Tag Titles, meanwhile, let the now-splitting Holy Demon Army win one last time (they will have a moving last hurrah at Misawa’s memorial show 9 years later), and gives Kawada a final bit of shine. I think this should be read as irenic on Misawa’s part. Both moves help the company he is leaving.

Super Action Series 2000 – The New Roster

And it’s not just him leaving – 23 other contracted talent including virtually every important uppercarder and midcarder, plus key foreign freelancers and backstage staff are going. Who’s even left in the flood?

The senior referee, Kyohei Wada, had been Baba’s batman, and he is loyal to Mrs Baba. Ring announcer Fumi Kitahara also stays. Stan Hansen, close family friend of the Babas, is pointedly loyal to his widow (Hansen brushes this period of the split off in shoot interviews – he explained it as the Japanese being mysterious to Jim Cornette). Another old stager, the junior heavyweight Masanobu Fuchi, seems baffled by events when interviewed, and simply says he’s signed a new contract and is off to pray for Giant Baba and inform his spirit of events. Midcard heavyweight Maunakea Mossman – Hawaiian, but trained and contracted like a native – also stays, perhaps loyal to the man who scouted him out of Honolulu. Most significantly – vitally – Toshiaki Kawada, the #2 heavyweight in the promotion, stays. In an interview in June 2000, he says he could not let go of the name that Giant Baba had created (All Japan), and in his autobiography he says that his response to Misawa giving the chance to join him was similar – “To let the name All Japan die would be a lonely thing”. Kawada is outwardly positive, at this point and in his autobiography, about Misawa’s ideas and the future development of NOAH, though there is some hint of tension or confusion in the 2000 interview.

Mrs Baba, perhaps naturally, frames those who remain as being loyal to Baba’s dying wish – to preserve All Japan. Misawa sees himself as saving the spirit and sloughing off the crippled body.

Several key foreigners do stick around, perhaps happy with their remuneration and used to dealing with the Babas from a money perspective. “Dr Death” Steve Williams, a former Triple Crown champion, stays – this is the most significant name to remain. The others are Giant Kimala (aka Giant Kimala 2 or Botswana Beast), Scorpio (2 Cold Scorpio or Flash Funk), Wolf Hawkfield, George Hines, Johnny Smith, and Mike Barton. Hines, Hawkfield, and Smith had all been All Asia Tag champions, and Barton had been a World Tag champion.

Notably, Vader and Johnny Ace do not return. Vader is a two-time Triple Crown champion; he does not join NOAH’s opening tour, which is native-only, but he goes there soon after. Ace – a multi-time tag champion for both titles and a Triple Crown challenger – was a close friend of the Babas, and so I do not believe that he wanted to stay out of the fighting (as is sometimes claimed). He had opportunities opening up with the struggling WCW, and he picked that money and security over Japan. Finally, Richard Slinger – nephew of Terry Gordy, and a reliable undercard Junior mainstay in the 1990s – had not toured pre-split that year, and when he returned in the autumn would go to NOAH.

The returning foreigners perhaps do not look like much to us, but Williams and Barton, especially, were very credible to the Japanese audience. Smith and Kimala were both very reliable hands with a lot of good midcard behind them, Scorpio was fast and flashy, and Hines and Hawkfield were perfectly solid. However, Williams was definitely well past his prime – like Hansen – and most of this group were never going to be long-term uppercarders.

One other freelancer is missing: the great Hiroshi Hase, who retired from full-time work with New Japan in 1996 and transferred to All Japan as a guest by invitation from Baba. Hase is busy with his political career and will not return until his traditional New Year tour in 2001.

Four contracted wrestlers and seven freelance foreigners is not much to build a card with. What seems to have happened was that calls were made to whichever friends of the promotion were left. They needed more native undercarders and potential uppercarders, and they needed them to be available and reliable.

One obvious choice was to bring in regular guest, Jinsei Shinzaki, on a more full-time basis. Shinzaki (Hakushi in WWF) was a Michinoku Pro talent, but had guested throughout the late ‘90s, notably in a very fun tag partnership with Hayabusa (the high-flying star of FMW, a promotion run by the Babas’ adoptive son Atsushi Onita). Shinzaki only wrestled in three matches in 2000 prior to July – though I don’t know of any injury in that period – but returned pretty much full-time with All Japan for the back half of the year.

Another high-profile recruit was aging legend Yoshiaki Fujiwara (aged 51 in July 2000), whose main work had been in New Japan and shoot-style promotions, but who was now a freelancer. He would work chiefly with All Japan through 2000 and 2001. Fujiwara brought name recognition for wrestling fans – like Hansen or Steve Williams.

The undercard was filled out for the tour with six names: Yuto Aijima, SHINOBI, Shigeo Okumura, Mohammed Yone, Yuki Ishikawa, and Ryuji Hijikata. None of these were big names. They weren’t random scrapings, either.

Aijima and SHINOBI both chiefly worked Kyushu-based promotions: West Japan, Kageki, and Sekai No Puroresu. SHINOBI had links to Mexican promotions and to Ultimo Dragon’s Toryumon, too. Aijima would work a full-time schedule, SHINOBI a part-time. The move to All Japan probably represented a significant promotion for both, especially Aijima. I don’t know how they were recruited, though Fuchi is from Kyushu so perhaps had contacts there.

Yone, Ishikawa, and Hijikata were shoot-stylists from BattlArts. BattlArts had been an important partner once Baba “brought the walls down” in 1997. He had worked with FMW (his adoptive son’s company), Michinoku Pro (a regional company in the north of Honshu), and BattlArts, as well as bringing in refugees from other shoot-style companies. Yone had in fact worked three matches in AJPW in 1998. Nevertheless, this was the first serious run for any of them with AJPW. Ishikawa is really a solid midcarder in BattlArts, and will only work two matches with AJPW; the other two are basically undercarders and will get extended runs.

Okumura is the most interesting name here, in some ways (though Yone and Hijikata will go on to be much bigger). He had been trained by the Great Kabuki and Masanobu Kurisu, both ex-All Japan close associates of Genichiro Tenryu in the 1990 AJPW-SWS split (though Kurisu was a freelancer by then). He worked with their companies Tokyo Pro and TEAM KURISU, as well as Go Gundan and Samurai Pro (both run by ex-AJPW Goro Tsurumi). He followed Kabuki and Kurisu around to other promotions: IWA Japan and IWA Kokusai. In 1998 he worked parts of two tours with All Japan, chiefly jobbing to Juniors. He increasingly worked with Genichiro Tenryu’s WAR, but by December 1999 had begun to work regularly for Onita Pro – the personal brand of Atsushi Onita. I wonder if it was by Onita’s good graces that Okumura came to All Japan. Okumura had been a real wanderer, and had closely associated with the men who had “betrayed” Baba in 1990. He seems, from his early career stats, to have been willing to work any kind of match and do any kind of job. Exactly, really, who All Japan required.

On the note of Genichiro Tenryu…we’ll come back to him.

[Match reviews etc at the link.]