Sell My Old Clothes, I’m Off To Watch Grom Zaza

Dan Rice

Welcome to the first edition of the Grom Guide, the Zaza Zoom-In, the Rings Reexamination? Ok, so I don’t have a locked-in title. I’ve had a Google doc keeping notes since almost the beginning of Violent People, titled “The Untitled Grom Zaza Project.” For posterity I think I’m sticking with that name. My goal here is simple: cover every bout of Grom Zaza’s wrestling career. Don’t worry, this is less daunting than it sounds. Like many of his shoot style compatriots, Zaza’s career was short lived and far from prolific.

Violent People has a reputation for tackling ambitious projects. We’re the home of the always on time, Lucha Round Up and Rotten Rewatch, and the totally not abandoned World’s Most Dangerous Retrospective. We’re known for making deadlines around here. I kid, but despite numerous other things I should be writing or finishing I wanted this out. I’ve had this on the back burner for too long. I need to spread the Grom Gospel. Damn it. That one’s not bad.

Grom Zaza is Zaza Tkeshelashvili, a Georgian Olympic freestyle wrestler and mixed martial artist. I firmly believe if Volk Han was never born, Grom Zaza would be a household name, at least in cool houses. Let’s get into it.


December 7, 1991 – Grom Zaza vs. Koichiro Kimura 

Rings Astral Step Final ~ Blaze Up

Ariake Coliseum – Tokyo, Japan

This is the first match of Grom Zaza’s wrestling career and his Rings debut. As such this is the opening match, so I watched some of the beginning video packages and I’m so glad I did. You get Akira Maeda interviewing Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield. The real treat though is a short promo from George Foreman. He says when he gets in shape he’s going to “add Akira Maeda” to his style and then get in real good shape and come to Japan and challenge Akira Maeda to a fight with no kicks. His pronunciation of “Akira Maeda” is insane. This is coming from a guy with a terrible track record of pronouncing names on Violent People Radio, but Foreman takes the cake here.

Kimura is a guy who is around for a long time in a bunch of different promotions. He got his start in FMW and WING. Here he is a 21 year old baby and he looks it. Grom, despite being only five years older, is already showing signs of becoming a silver fox, who looks like he’s seen some shit. Even this early in his career, you can tell he’s a guy who carries the weight of some stories on his shoulders.

The match started fast—Kimura hits a trip, forcing an immediate rope break. Zaza responds with impressive takedowns of his own, including a big swinging double-leg slam. Zaza is clearly adjusting to pro wrestling here. The majority of his strikes are honestly not great looking. They’re tentative and soft, but about every tenth strike is a stiff accidental potato, so that’s fun. Kimura strikes are nothing special either. Both men use a plethora of submissions to varying degrees of success. Zaza’s standing arm locks don’t look particularly threatening, but he pulls out two gross looking STFs.

The real highlight and strength of both men is their takedowns. Kimura tries for a lot of throws and sweeps, while Zaza sticks mainly to single and double leg takedowns. The inexperience of both competitors actually works to their benefits with a real struggle and grit to every takedown and grappling exchange. Not a single throw or suplex looks at all cooperative. Zaza is also a vocal wrestler. He grunts and screams with every big slam. 

Unfortunately in a very un-shoot style move this match is well over twenty minutes long. I cannot see the logic of sending these two inexperienced wrestlers out there for that long, in an opening match no less. Grom Zaza starts his career off on the right foot though and gets the submission victory with a shoulder lock. They have a lot of fun ideas, but not enough to fill that length. Despite flashes of promise, the match’s length and shaky strikes make it a tough one to recommend. But, Zaza’s potential is undeniable and this is just the beginning.


May 16, 1992 – Grom Zaza vs. Volk Han

Rings Mega Battle 4th: Korin

Ariake Coliseum – Tokyo, Japan

Volk Han submitting Grom Zaza

Volk Han is a shoot style legend. I can’t imagine a scenario where someone is 600 words into a Grom Zaza column and hasn’t at least heard of Volk Han. These two are sometimes teammates and training partners, but despite this and Han having only a couple matches more than Zaza they’re at very different levels in the Rings hierarchy. Volk Han wrestled, Rings boss and top star, Akira Maeda in his first match. He’s a very pushed star while Zaza is still cutting his teeth.

After a quick slap of hands, Zaza wastes no time in dumping Han on his head with a fireman’s carry. Once on the ground Zaza snaps on a cross armlock. It’s clear pretty quickly that Zaza has been working on his submission game since his first bout. 

Han is as flawless as advertised here. His strikes are crisp and always seem to land with a real purpose. Some of his kicks are meant to land hard and injure his opponents, while others are parrying shots. Short jabs and kicks to get inside and get a takedown. He hits a gorgeous floatover armbar that transitions to a triangle choke in mid move.

Like in his previous match, Zaza’s style still has an unpolished, almost uncooperative quality. His rough-around-the-edges style adds a unique dimension to his overall game. His striking is better here too. Whether that’s because he’s more comfortable walloping his friend or he’s worked on that aspect, who can tell? Grom drops Han at one point and begins to land multiple stiff kicks to Han’s stomach, before being backed away by the referee. Han returns the favor later with an absolutely killer spinning back fist(chop?)

There’s far too many cool things to list from this match. Zaza tries to escape a rear waistlock only for Han to flip him over and take his back. Overall it is worked evenly almost 50/50, but it works here. Volk Han eventually gets the win with a reverse STF slash twister looking submission. Amazing stuff from both men, clearly the highlight of Grom Zaza’s wrestling career so far.


August 21, 1992 – Grom Zaza vs. Shtorm Koba 

Rings Mega Battle Special: Foundation

Yokohama Arena – Yokohama, Japan

Shtorm is a bit of a mystery. This is his second of two Rings bouts and then he would never wrestle again. Google mostly comes up empty when searching for him. There’s video and a couple reviews of his two Rings matches and that’s it…except, one true hero/freak using TEW 2020 to book a 2002 version of PWFG featuring Ken Shamrock, Dean Malenko, and our very own Shtorm Koba. 

TEW freaks are the best

This began with some pitter patter strikes from Grom that are honestly a little tepid. Just when you might start to complain, he hits a wild flying headscissors crucifix takedown thing. He follows this up with an insane gut wrench suplex that almost throws Shtorm out of the ring, Tank Abbott style. After this Grom chains together several submissions and he really cranks them. In just three matches his submission game has gotten so much better.

Shtorm doesn’t show much at the beginning, but he does eventually hit a nice trip and a gut wrench suplex of his own. This basically becomes a suplex bombfest. Shtorm hits a shoot style press slam, A SHOOT STYLE PRESS SLAM. This eventually ends with a truly sick looking full nelson from Grom Zaza. Our hero gets the victory. 

This bout is not nearly as tight as the Volk Han match, which is probably a much better match in the traditional sense. This match was fun as hell though. A definite Hoot of the Year contender in the VP1992s.


Thanks for joining me for the first edition of The Untitled Grom Zaza Project. Belive it or not were already almost 10% of the way through Grom Zaza’s wrestling career. I promise this series it’ll be just as prompt and timely as our Rotten Rewatch series!

dan-r


Co-host of Talking Tourneys and Violent People Radio, all around violent person.