WWE In Japan: 5 Great Matches You Need To Know

It's not uncommon for WWE to give midcarders and others traditionally lower on the card a crack at the main event if that main event is non-televised and takes place in the performer's home town/country. Which is precisely why Tajiri was granted a shot at the World Heavyweight Title in Tokyo in January of 2003.

Tajiri was a Smackdown superstar at the time but was temporarily drafted to Raw for the tour (he beat Chris Jericho on the previous two nights). While this match wasn't televised, a full length version did circulate online some time ago and a truncated version still exists in the usual places.

If you can track down the full length version it's worth sitting through. The Game gets a lot of hate for his supposedly subpar 2003, but he was on form here, really putting over The Japanese Buzzsaw in front of 13,000 of his countrymen. After controlling Trips with armdrags and kicks in the early going, the current WWE COO took over and began wearing the mist-sprayer down.

Tajiri came back with his usual explosive offense, rocking the champ with yet more kicks, a handspring back elbow and the dreaded Tarantula submission hold. A buzzsaw kick looked to have done the job but Tajiri missed a moonsault making him easy prey for Triple H and his Pedigree.

1...2...BUT HE KICKED OUT! Yes, Tajiri actually got to kick out of the Pedigree back when just about nobody did, for a scintillating near fall. He'd succumb to a second one just moments later, after Triple H kicked out of a tornado DDT and avoided the buzzsaw kick but, after over twenty minutes of thrilling action, few were left disappointed by the result.