WCW LA: Round 1, Match 8: #22 Ultimo Dragon vs. #43 Masato Tanaka

[Shocky]

The following match takes place in the WCW region under WCW Rules from LA, Ca. The rin entrance and ring are equal height.

#22. Ultimo Dragon

vs.

#43. Masato Tanaka

 

[klunderbunker]

As absolutely freaking sweet as that Dragon picture is, I'm still going with him. Tanaka has put on some great matches, but none of them that I can remember are against people not named Mike Awesome. That's really all he's known for is one great feud. Dragon wasn't exactly a no name in WCW. He won some titles and some great matches with many different opponents. Throw in that he was able to win that many titles and he's hard to trump.

 

[Tastycles]

Tanaka had a pretty good run in ECW and briefly got the better of Mike Awesome, but his acheivements have nothing on Ultimo Dragon. Dragon has won titles in the biggest promotions in the three main markets, as well as being a superb innovator in the ring.

He's smaller than Tanaka, but much quicker, and I think he'd go over here.

 

[jmt225]

Man, I'm a fan of Ultimo Dragon and all that, but at the same time... I can't help but feel he's extremely overrated by the IWC, and that Masato Tanaka would kick his ass. Dragon would put up a good fight, but at the end of the day, he doesn't have what it takes to defeat someone like Masato Tanaka, in my mind. I don't care if Tanaka has never had a match in WCW or not... the fact is that he's a tough motherfucker, who would throw Ultimo around that ring like a rag doll.

Masato Tanaka gets this rep that all he can do is "Hardcore" stuff in his matches, and that's completely false. If you've only watched his ECW stuff, then I can understand why you've come to that conclusion, but if you're not ignorant to his work in FMW (which, yes, did have a lot of non-violent matches), Zero-1, and NJPW, then you know good and well that Masato can have great, kick ass matches in a regular bout just as well as he could in a hardcore environment. And against Ultimo Dragon... it would be one hell of a match, but I just can't see Dragon pulling off the victory, in any circumstance.

 

[NSL]

Ultimo Dragon is one of the guys that I'm pushing to do well here. It's impossible to be over-rated when you can sport more gold than the entire Wu-Tang Clan, G-Unit, and Snoop Dogg combined. He's a phenomenal wrestler, and is one of the main reasons that modern fans even know masked wrestlers.

Tanaka was OK in ECW, but his best matches all involved Mike Awesome, and Awesome robbed Corino to get his win.

Dragon wins, and hopefully keeps going...

 

[Theo Mays]

I got Dragon here. Dragon is a champion machine, while Tanaka is know for battling Mike Awesome. Should be a good fight, with Tanaka take a good chunk of life from Dragon, but Dragon comes back and gains the W. And like NSL said, he could be a sleeper in this thing.

 

[Shocky]

Masato Tanaka gets labeled as pretty much a one dimensional Hardcore Spot Monkey, I'm not sure that's entirely true, or entirely false. The guy has had some pretty decent matches without the hardcore environment, but when you take a look at his body, you clearly begin to see what this guy was all about. WCW was a region that cruiserweights could excel in, and Dragon did pretty damn well in that ring. Tanaka was good, but Dragon was better.

BTW, has this match ever happened?