What do you think of Jinsei Shinzaki?

[Guest The Rising Star]

Is he good or just average?

[Guest Old Brown Heineken]

In the WWE, he was not a powerhouse Jr. wrestler, but a aerial heavyweight wrestler. So, you couldn't see Hakushi powerbomb his opponent, but you could see him handsping moonsault him. In Japan, there are so many good wrestlers, and why did the WWE choose Hakushi?

In my opinion, Hakushi is an all-round wrestler, he has both power and aerial moves. He was a mysterious wrestler and the King of Rookie in Japan too. So he was choosen by the WWE. Then when he wrestled here as a heel, he did quite well. However, when he turned to be a fan favourite, AND was tied up with Barry Horrowitz, he could not be a great wrestler again. It seemed that Barry Horrowitz destroyed Hakushi's career in North-America...

[Guest Dangerous Back Drop]

Shinzaki vacillates between fun as Hell and lazy as Hell, depending upon his mood. He's like 1990-1999 Mutoh's Mini-Me in terms of sometimes having good matches and stinking it up other times.

[Guest RickyChosyu]

I don't think Shinzaki deserves to be Mutoh's mini-me. At least with Mutoh, you've got a hand full of performances where he clearly had some greatness. Where are the stand-out Shinzaki performances?

[Guest Dangerous Back Drop]

That makes him all the more Mutoh's Mini-Me. He also doesn't have big-time suckfests like Mutoh/Kawada, so that cuts both ways.

[Guest RickyChosyu]

Ah, but just because Jinsei's big time suck fests were mostly on small indy shows doesn't make them any less sucky. Pop in a tape of These Days and watch the main event if you don't believe me, or better yet, watch him lay a stinker on TAKA on 12/17/96 while the poor guy tries to get something out of him. Had he done that stuff with Kawada, he's probably get the same response that Mutoh's getting.

[Guest Ace309]

I like Jinsei, personally, in the sense that I find his moveset and character entertaining. I don't think he's a consistently good worker, but that doesn't stop me from enjoying matches he's in.

[Guest cynicalprofit]

Great compared to the vast majorioty of the WWF wrestlers in the promotion at the time, very mutaesque other wise and his stuff looks rather tame by todays standards.

[Guest KanadianKrusty]

I like him, his gimmick is pretty cool, his moveset is fun, and he's a pretty talented worker but at times he's downright painful to watch.

 

Not a great worker by any means but when he's "on", it's pretty entertaining.

[Guest Dangerous A]

He is alright. Not great by any means. His work in the US comes off a little better because he's doing his thing here and gets a better reaction because fans aren't used to him. His stuff in Japan is decent to downright horrible. Him being in the main in These Days was downright sickening considering what was before his shitfest. His stuff from FMW wasn't anything to be proud of either. I've seen a match with him and Hayabusa vs Kawada and Taue that was very good though.

[Guest Dangerous A]

Dreaded double post!!!!!

[Guest Black Tiger]

I just reviewed the AJPW New Year Giant Series for 411, and the Hayabusa/Shinzaki vs Honda/Inoue match was awful. I gave the match ** because of Hayabusa's attempts to be entertaining. Shinzaki did next to nothing the whole match other than pray, and bleed, (and holy SHIT, did he ever bleed). I'm probably going to see some of his FMW work now as my local FYE has started to carry the FMW DVDs by Tokyo Pop.

 

In the WWF he was able to get over quite easy because it was WWF in 1995 and almost nobody was entertaining the fans with their matches with the only exeptions of HBK and 1-2-3 Kid.

[Guest RickyChosyu]

See, here's the thing with Jinsei: people always talk about how good he is "when he's on," but that might as well be Happy Special La La land to me, because I've never seen it. Every time he turns up on a tape I get, he's robotic, goofy, and about as interesting as jabbing a pencil into one's ear. I hear excuses about how in M-Pro he had no reason to perform, since he had a never ending push, but when he turns up on an AJPW tape, he sucks there, too. Dido for New Japan. So it would seem that even on a larger stage, he's not afraid to suck whole heartedly.

[Guest TheGame2705]

From what I've seen of him he's not bad by any means. Boring, sure. Bad, no. I really liked him in what I saw of Hayabusa/Shinzaki vs. Kawada/Taue.

[Guest PlatypusFool]

He's a pile of rubbish in almost everything i've seen him in. Due to his selfishness he had dreadful matches with both TAKA and Hayabusa when they were near their primes, which is pretty difficult really. He's only good when placed so he's not the centre of attension and being carried, like with him & Hayabusa vs. Takayama & Omori from 99, which is a whole lot of fun, if not very good.

[Guest RickyChosyu]

I guess our grading scales are different, game. For me, borring = bad. Wrestling's goal is to engage the viewer, and if a wrestler can't pull that off, there's inevitably something wrong with their abilities.

 

Maybe I was just watching the wrong Jinsei matches, but even in '98, he should have been able to do way more with Misawa than he did in their Giant Series match to be a "fun worker." His match with Muta at Batle Formation '96 is also a stinker. I realize it's Plunder Lunvin' Muta, but he didn't try to take the match somewhere anymore than Mutoh did. He's been tollerable in some tags I've seen of him, but he does little to contribute other than a few nice looking spots. There's enough wrestlers out there who offer nothing but spots already.

[Guest Riots bloodlust]

I guess this all depends on what you're looking for. Personally I usually find Jinsei pretty fun to watch. Not one of the all time greatest, to be sure, but in my mind someone worth remembering. I personally really liked his ring concept in his match vs Misawa at the Giant Series '98 I believe, where he was smart enough to DUCK Misawa's elbows. Presented a different approach to fighting the All Japan 90's main event style that I found fun to watch. The finish to the match was of course a foregone conclusion, but I liked seeing how long Jinsei could, in the kayfabe sense, keep himself in the game. IMHO

[Guest RickyChosyu]

Are sure that was a "different approach" to facing Misawa, because I remember reading about the Misawa/Williams matches where an integral spot was Doc ducking the Elbow and hitting the Dangerous Backdrop. I'm guessing there had to have been others that tried it, too.

 

I do like "Big Dog vs. Underdog" matches too, but only if they're done properly. Shinzaki brought his offense, but he didn't bring enough attitude to make the storyline work for me. Big combacks from him that could have meant a lot tended to get brushed over in favor of more spots. It was passable, but not anything I'm going to go and re-watch.

[Guest Riots bloodlust]

True, many people do duck the elbow. If memory serves, I recall Kawada doing that and hitting his dangerous backdrop inside the first 15 seconds of one of their matches. The difference I saw was that Jinsei was working hard to avoid it at all costs, since he knew he would lose the All Japan style exchange of blows. But like I said, it's just my opinion. I found it to be harmless fun, and something a little different. Call Jinsei a guilty pleasure of mine, or call some of my tastes off beat, I don't care, cause that's just my 2 cents.

[Guest TheMadmanGreg]

I always like Jinsei. I had no idea so many people didn't.

[Guest XdojimeX]

Shinzaki could bust out some pretty slick athletic offense from time to time, but thats about as "on" as I've seen the guy. The athletic potential was there but he'd usually go right back to looking lost, working his yawner of a gimmick or selling like a cold fish. I remember a couple matches I really liked though.

 

vs. Sasuke (early M-Pro, '94). This is mostly Sasuke IIRC but Shinzaki provided a decent base for Sasuke at the height of his spot-fu powers. This actually was a pretty big cult hit with the hardcores at the time, even got some light MOTYC pub in a loaded year like '94.

 

The afformentioned tag with Kawada/Taue. Admittedly he looked pretty damn fired up here. Kinda made you think if he kept working in this environment he might of turned into a good worker. Kawada/Taue did a smart solid job carrying the indy punks (much better than the Misawa/Akiyama team), showcasing their offense without showing too much ass in the end. All Japan probably should of raided the indys at this point since their dojo wasnt cranking out shit.

 

vs. Gannosuke. My favorite Shinzaki match. Great offense and nearfalls, gimmick spots that worked, bloody and hateful, wild crowd. This was damn fun. Hell FMW '98 was damn fun. Like a sleazy spot-fu bizarro world All Japan or something.

[Guest Dynamite Kido]

I think this is the easiest way to put it with him.

 

In America = Awesome

 

In Japan = Average

[Guest Riots bloodlust]

Well, I still remember the matches he had with Bret Hart way back when. They struck me as pretty damn awesome back then. Wish I had kept the tape I had that on. I haven't seen it in a long time, but the fact that it stuck in my mind should say something there.

[Guest RickyChosyu]

For the WWF in 1995, Hokushi's offense was very cutting edge, and would naturally stick out in someone's mind who was watching back then. Not to mention it was a miserable year and even the smallest possitives like Hokushi busting out the Space Flying Tiger Drop stand out even more amonst the crap.

 

I think xdojime, as usual, said it best: Shinzaki showed a few glimpses of becoming more than a spotty indy-level attraction, but never reached anything above that and was very often a terrible performer.

[Guest The Rising Star]

Has Shinzaki ever had any matches against Super Delfin?

[Maztinho 0]

Granted I'm not a Puroresu super fan like some of you guys, but I enjoy Jinsei. I mean sure compared to some other guys he's not great, but hell, I get a kick out of him.

[Guest RickyChosyu]

Has Shinzaki ever had any matches against Super Delfin?

Singles matches? Probably yes. None of them made any headlines, though, so you'd probably have to dig to find any.

 

They were a team in 94, so you can probably find plenty of matches with them together there.