10 Most Unforgettable Exhibition Matches In Wrestling History
3. Antonio Inoki Vs. The Great Antonio
The year after the fiasco with Ali, Japan’s living legend (and founder of New Japan Pro Wrestling) Antonio Inoki was scheduled to take on his namesake, the Great Antonio.
Any similarity between the two began and ended at their chosen pseudonym. The Great Antonio was a Croatian strongman, a massive weirdo who’d built stories around himself by lying his enormous backside off. He claimed to have been able to uproot trees with sheer upper body strength by the age of twelve, and in later life would tell people that he was an alien.
Inoki himself was the legendarily proud progenitor of ‘strong style’ Japanese wrestling: the contrast made for a mis-match made in hell, which was exactly the point. The conceit of the exhibition bout between the two was the comparison between the heroic good guy, all rules, technique and rigid pride, taking on the grotesque foreign monster, a shambling wild man. It’s classic pro wrestling booking for a reason - the angle still makes good money in 2016.
Unfortunately, the match veered wildly off-script very quickly. The 9,000 fans in attendance saw the match begin awkwardly, but more or less as expected… and then the Great Antonio began to go into business for himself, simply no-selling Inoki’s moves. The Croatian didn’t even do Inoki the favour of powering through his offence: he simply stood there as if nothing had happened.
And of course, nothing had – but the audience wasn’t supposed to know that. At the point that the gaijin wrestler began clubbing him with clumsy blows to his back and shoulders, Inoki realised that his opponent had gone off-book… and reacted exactly the way you’d expect a genuine shoot fighter with legendary pride and an old school mentality to react. He beat the living tar out of the nutcase.
Striking the Croatian in the face over and over, Inoki executed a perfect single-leg takedown and methodically, vengefully, proceeded to kick his opponent into the middle of next week. The Great Antonio, uprooter of trees, was beaten to an unconscious, bloody pulp by the fiery wrestling legend. You don’t mess with the best.