| FMW 4th Anniversary Show: Origin | |||
|---|---|---|---|
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| Promotion | Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling | ||
| Date | May 5, 1993 | ||
| City | Kawasaki, Kanagawa,Japan | ||
| Venue | Kawasaki Stadium | ||
| Attendance | 41,000[1] | ||
| Event chronology | |||
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| FMW Anniversary Show chronology | |||
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FMW 4th Anniversary Show: Origin was aprofessional wrestling event produced byFrontier Martial-Arts Wrestling (FMW). The event took place on May 5, 1993 at theKawasaki Stadium inKawasaki, Kanagawa,Japan. This was the fourth edition of the company's flagship eventAnniversary Show, commemorating the fourth anniversary of the company.
Themain event was ano rope exploding barbed wire time bomb deathmatch betweenAtsushi Onita andTerry Funk, which Onita won.[2] The event was also notable for aCaptain's FallLosing Captain Leaves TownNo Rope Barbed Wire Tornado Street Fight Deathmatch pittingTarzan Goto, The Great Punk andKatsuji Ueda against Team Canada membersRicky Fuji,Big Titan andThe Gladiator in a losing effort. The event featured interpromotional matches between female wrestlers of FMW andLadies Legend Pro-Wrestling (LLPW) andAll Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling (AJW).[3]
FMW decided to capitalize on the huge success of the2nd Anniversary Show on September 23, 1991 at the hugeKawasaki Stadium as the show drew a crowd of 33,000.[4] FMWbooked their 4th Anniversary Show at the Kawasaki Stadium on May 5, 1993 to commemorate the fourth anniversary of the company and the huge crowd attraction was a dream match between the company's promoter and main starAtsushi Onita andhardcore wrestling idolTerry Funk. FMW signed Kawasaki Stadium to be the company's venue for future shows on May 5.[5]
Atsushi Onita defeatedTiger Jeet Singh to regain theWWA World Martial Arts Heavyweight Championship at the3rd Anniversary Show[6] and ended hisrivalry withSabu andThe Sheik after successfully defending the title against Sabu on January 12[7] and winning Sheik's United States Championship on January 18.[8] Onita returned the title to Sheik after the match because he felt that Sheik deserved the title which formed a trio of Onita, Sheik and Sabu, leading to Sheik and Sabutransitioning intofan favorites.[5] On February 16, Onita defeatedThe Gladiator in ano rope exploding barbed wire deathmatch.[9] During the match,Ricky Fuji wrapped barbed wire around Onita's neck and Onita accidentally swallowed some of the barbed wire which gave him a near-fatal injury and put him out of action for two months.[5] He returned to FMW in asix-man tag team match on April 22.[10][11]
On January 12, 1993, the fan favorite team of Sambo Asako, Ricky Fuji,Mr. Gannosuke and Great Punk took on thevillainous team ofBig Titan, The Gladiator, The Sheik andDr. Luther in aneight-man elimination tag team match. Fuji turned on FMW by causing Goto to get eliminated by Big Titan and became a villain.[7] Fuji formed astable Team Canada with Big Titan, Gladiator, Luther,Horace Boulder and Dr. Hannibal, which would lead to matches between FMW and Team Canada at 4th Anniversary Show.[5]
Megumi Kudo andCombat Toyoda lost toAll Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling (AJW)'sBull Nakano andAkira Hokuto at 3rd Anniversary Show.[6] This match received huge acclaim and paved the way for more interpromotional matches between women of AJW and FMW. On November 27, 1992, FMW'sEriko Tsuchiya and Yoshika Maedomari defeated formerAJW Tag Team Champions Sakie Hasegawa andDebbie Malenko.[12] The success of AJW and FMW's match lead to Kudo and Toyoda being invited to AJW to participate in the Dream Slam events. They lost to AJW'sWWWA World Tag Team ChampionsManami Toyota andToshiyo Yamada in a highly acclaimed main event of Dream Slam I.[13] Kudo and Toyoda defeated Las Cachorras Orientales (Etsuko Mita andMima Shimoda) at Dream Slam II.[14] On April 22, it was announced that Kudo and Toyoda would take on Toyota and Yamada in a Dream Slam I rematch at 4th Anniversary Show.[15]
Eiji Ezaki defeatedKoji Nakagawa in the opening match by performing aMoonsault. The second match was awomen's wrestling match in whichRie Nakamura defeated Keiko Iwame with arolling cradle.[2][3]
Miwa Sato,Eriko Tsuchiya, Yoshika Maedomari, Kumiko Matsuda and Yukie Nabeno represented FMW againstLLPW's Eagle Sawai, Utako Ozumi, Yasha Kurenai, Midori Saito and Mikiko Futagami in aCaptain's Fall match. Sato captained Combat Army while Sawai captained her team. Maedomari eliminated Futagami to gain the first elimination of the match. Sawai rebounded by eliminating Maedomari. Tsuchiya then eliminated Kurenai and Sawai pinned the opposing team's captain Sato following aPowerbomb to win the match. Eliminations for both teams tied at 2.[2][3]
The Sheik andSabu defeated Team Canada'sDr. Luther and Dr. Hannibal in atag team match when Sabu performed a Moonsault on Luther. After the match, Sabu went crazy by putting himself through a table with a Moonsault and then put himself through the second table with aflying leg drop.The Great Sasuke, Kendo and Battle Ranger Z defeatedSuper Delfin, Espanto IV and Espanto V in ajunior heavyweightsix-man tag team match when Kendo pinned Espanto V with a cradle. LLPW'sShinobu Kandori defeated Victoria Kazumiya with aFujiwara armbar in adifferent style fight.[2][3]
Megumi Kudo andCombat Toyoda took onAJW'sToshiyo Yamada andManami Toyota in a rematch of the Dream Slam I main event. Yamada and Toyota performed many high-flying moves to control the early portion of the match until Kudo and Toyoda delivered adouble clothesline to gain momentum and then Kudo performed atiger suplex on Toyota to win the match.[2][3]
FMW's The Great Punk,Katsuji Ueda andTarzan Goto took on Team Canada'sRicky Fuji,Big Titan andThe Gladiator in a Captain's Falllosing captain leaves townno rope barbed wire tornado street fight deathmatch. Fuji captained his team while Punk captained FMW's team. Titan eliminated Ueda with aPowerbomb to gain advantage and then Goto eliminated Titan with aLariat to even the score. Awesome was tripped into the barbed wire and then Goto and Punk double teamed Fuji until Awesome escaped it and performed anAwesome Bomb on Punk and Fuji followed with aGerman suplex to eliminate him and get the win for Team Canada.[2][3]
Grigory Verichev took onLeon Spinks in a different style match. Verichev made Spinks submit to across armbar in the third round to win the match.[2][3]
Atsushi Onita headlined his fourth straightAnniversary Show againstTerry Funk in ano rope exploding barbed wire time bomb deathmatch. As the name suggested, the ring would explode after each fifteen minutes into the match. Onita delivered aFlowing Snap DDT to Funk for the win just nearly four minutes within the explosion of the entire ring. Onita left the ring when thirty seconds were left but Funk was unable to move due to his injury and then Onita put himself on Funk to take the blast and the two embraced after the match.[2][3]
The 4th Anniversary Show was a huge success for FMW as the key attraction of the event was the main event match between Atsushi Onita and Terry Funk, which drew a crowd of 41,000, the biggest for FMW until then and the event brought a revenue of $1,800,000.[1]
4th Anniversary Show received mixed reviews from Ryan Mencuso ofPuroresu Central. He rated the event 5.5 stars. He considered it "a two match show" rating the interpromotional match of Kudo and Toyoda vs. Toyota and Yamada "the high quality of match that fans expect from those 4 ladies" and called the Onita vs. Funk main event "a great spectacle to watch", with "The worked shoot matches were really bad. The six-man barbed wire match wasn't good, but it could have also been much worse. Everything else was clipped into pieces. TheMichinoku Pro six man tag looked really fun. In the end, Toyota & Yamada vs. Kudo & Toyoda along with Funk vs. Onita are the only things worth checking out from this show. If you haven't seen those two matches, then this show is worth watching. If you have, then don't bother getting this show."[2]
Following his win over Terry Funk, Atsushi Onita resumed his rivalry with Team Canada. In the summer of 1993,Mr. Pogo leftW*ING and returned to FMW and restarted his feud with Onita. AtSummer Spectacular, on August 22, Onita defeated Pogo to replace theWWA World Martial Arts Heavyweight Championship with theFMW Brass Knuckles Heavyweight Championship. By the fall of the year, another W*ING wrestler Mitsuhiro Matsunaga defected to FMW and W*ING began declining which forced the promotion to close in 1994. Many of former W*ING wrestlers began feuding with Onita and formedW*ING Alliance with the mission of ending FMW. Onita began arivalry withGenichiro Tenryu and took part in interpromotional matches between FMW and Tenryu'sWAR to build momentum for Onita vs. Tenryu as the main event of the5th Anniversary Show.[16] Onita manipulated the crowd into attending the show by putting aretirement stipulation if he lost and he lost to Tenryu but then revealed that the retirement stipulation would be for May 5, 1995, a year later. Onita retired after defeatingHayabusa at the6th Anniversary Show.[5][17]
Megumi Kudo's alliance with Combat Toyoda began to break up after the 4th Anniversary Show due to Aja Kong's disrespect towards Toyoda causing jealousy between Toyoda and Kudo. On June 28, Kudo, Toyoda and Miwa Sato lost toNoriyo Tateno, Eriko Tsuchiya and Yoshika Maedomari after Tateno pinned Sato.[18] Toyoda attacked Sato after the match and then Kudo tried to stop her but Toyoda attacked her as well and smashed a chair on Yukie Nabeno's head, prompting Kudo to attack Toyoda and Toyodaturnedvillain.[15] She reunited with Tsuchiya and Maedomari to reform their Combat Army under the new name Mad Dog Military. On July 24, Toyoda defeated Kudo to win theWWA World Women's Championship.[19]
| No. | Results[1][2][3][10] | Stipulations | Times |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Eiji Ezaki defeatedKoji Nakagawa | Singles match | 10:03 |
| 2 | Rie Nakamura defeated Keiko Iwame | Singles match | 10:45 |
| 3 | Eagle Sawai, Utako Ozumi, Yasha Kurenai, Midori Saito and Mikiko Futagami defeated Combat ArmyMiwa Sato,Eriko Tsuchiya, Yoshika Maedomari, Kumiko Matsuda and Yukie Nabeno | Captain's Fall match | 25:52 |
| 4 | The Sheik andSabu defeated Team Canada (Dr. Luther and Dr. Hannibal) | Tag team match | 6:53 |
| 5 | The Great Sasuke, Kendo and Battle Ranger Z defeatedSuper Delfin, Espanto IV and Espanto V | Six-man tag team match | 20:22 |
| 6 | Shinobu Kandori defeated Victoria Kazumiya via submission | Different Style Fight | 5:18 |
| 7 | Combat Toyoda andMegumi Kudo defeatedToshiyo Yamada andManami Toyota | Tag team match | 22:17 |
| 8 | Team Canada (Ricky Fuji,Big Titan andThe Gladiator) defeatedKatsuji Ueda, The Great Punk andTarzan Goto | Captain's FallLosing Captain Leaves TownNo Rope Barbed Wire Tornado Street Fight Deathmatch | 9:31 |
| 9 | Grigory Verichev defeatedLeon Spinks via submission in 3rd round | Different Style Fight | 2:09 |
| 10 | Atsushi Onita defeatedTerry Funk | No Rope Exploding Barbed Wire Time Bomb Deathmatch[20] | 12:14 |