Glass Hand Dissolving: Hayabusa & Jinsei Shinzaki

 

vs Giant Kimala & Jun Izumida (AJPW 11/15/1997)

I just watched Giant Kimala in 1990 WWC and came away impressed; this is seven years later, and he's much more limited. Izumida isn't much better. That makes this match more about Hayabusa and Shinzaki building their match around their offense, with a short section where they sell for Kimala. It isn't very good; I wouldn't say it was bad, but it didn't really do anything for me either. 

vs Akira Taue & Toshiaki Kawada (AJPW 11/23/1997)

These All Japan tags, especially the ones featuring the stars of the promotion, don't take on a standard match format; they just turn into rock fights, with varying degrees of big move sequences. As far as those go, this is fine; it's a pretty good match, with an interesting combination of guys, not anything I'd say is an all-time good match, but a very solid match. I think a lot of what carries these matches is the novelty of FMW's big stars being in All Japan and matching up against the stars of that promotion, and they wrestle the match in that way. I think in 2026, some of that, it isn't lost on me, but it doesn't have the same effect. 

vs Mitsuharu Misawa & Jun Akiyama (AJPW 11/27/1997)

This is a better version of the previous match. There is more of a traditional structure. I would say Misawa pretty much works a heat on Hayabusa, but really this is a match built around Hayabusa and Shinzaki hitting their spots. It is a testament to everyone involved that they built a pretty good match around that. Akiyama and Hayabusa work the closing stretch, and work a pretty good segment where Akiyama can't put Hayabusa away, in a way that avoids being a WHATS IT GONNA TAKE!!!, which is a difficult needle to thread sometimes. 

vs Tamon Honda & Jun Izumida (AJPW 2/13/1999)

Izumida and Honda work a lot of this match around headbutts. It's an interesting choice, and a unique match construction. I don't know if it entirely works, but it is a novel idea, and when Shinzaki gets busted open sort of justifies all of it. Outside of that, nothing grabs me here; Hayabusa hits a pretty brutal phoenix splash as part of the finish. I think that sometimes you put two big names together, like Tenryu and Hansen, and through sheer force of talent and personality, they can be a great team. Sometimes, that just doesn't really gel or come to the front; I would say that's the deal here. Nothing is bad, but the matches don't ever rise above a certain level. 

vs Masato Tanaka & Tetsuhiro Kuroda (FMW 5/5/1999)

This is an interesting contrast. Thus far the matches have been novel pairings, where guys are wrestling each other for the first time, and the matches have a certain feel because of that. We don't have that here, we have the opposite, theses guys have wrestled each other for years. I don't know if this match is any better off for that fact, I can say I enjoyed it less than some of the All Japan matches, even if it followed a more traditional structure. 

Verdict

This is not a bad team. It just isn't a team that stands out to me as good. Some of the matches are good, nothing great, but good. None of the matches are bad, but a couple hover around okay.