2020 Ongoing MOTY List: Kassius Ohno vs. Kenny Williams

Kassius Ohno vs. Kenny Williams NXT UK 3/6 (Aired 3/19/20)

ER: I wish we were still getting one match every couple weeks that is just Kassius Ohno working as territory champ Flair, making every local 160 pounder look like they have a shot at beating him. And sometimes they beat him! Not only does Ohno break out a new trick in every single one of his NXT UK matches, he does it  with such confidence and logic that it really makes for a perfect 7 minute match. Ohno has an honest approach to a match - very much like Finlay in WCW or WWE - where he sells and bumps appropriately for the offense actually being performed, and seems to have fun coming up with opponent-specific counters. If an opponent's move doesn't hit flush, he doesn't sell the move as if it landed the way it was supposed to land. It forces his opponent to work honest knowing that Ohno will be giving no quarter. It cannot be an accident that Ohno was the guy in the ring when several very different NXT UK wrestlers had their best match. 

Kenny Williams is a hit or miss NXT UK guy, who has been at his best when against NXT UK's best. He's had several really good matches, but all of them have come against Ohno, Noam Dar, and Jordan Devlin, the literal three best wrestlers in NXT UK. Still, there are plenty of guys on the roster who haven't had matches this good against those three, so some of the credit has to be given to Williams. This match has a lot of ideas that get taken interesting directions. I expected it to be Williams relying on quickness to stay a step ahead of Ohno, but instead it was Ohno pushing pace and Williams struggling to catch up. Williams would get away with a rolling prawn or a headscissors but Ohno was catching him easily. I think Williams did a good job of upping his strikes just to survive. He had a couple elbows that landed hard, and Ohno reacted appropriately.  

Ohno was smart about creating plausible openings, like when he catches a springboard crossbody, tosses Williams up into a fireman's carry, and then nearly loses the match when Williams rolls through into a tight crucifix pin. Ohno breaks out a neat trick to block a second Williams springboard, as instead of trying to knock Williams off the apron he just waits until Williams grabs the ropes to spring, and grinds his boot squarely into Williams' hand to hold him in place. I mentioned appropriate-to-the-offense selling, and I thought Ohno did a great job with that as Williams started hitting big flying offense. There's a tope that's enough to knock Ohno into the barricade, a tope that lands a bit more flush into the aisle, a great Coffin Drop off the middle buckle to the floor, and a missile dropkick back in the ring. Ohno goes down for the Coffin Drop, but doesn't go down for the missile dropkick because it doesn't hit as hard as a man's weight crashing into you from the buckles to the floor. I love that Finlay mindset of "If you knock me down with a dropkick, then I'll get knocked down by a dropkick", and it makes the shotgun dropkick that *does* knock Ohno down mean a lot more. Ohno, however, breaks out another trick, catching a headscissors before it starts and kicking out Williams' plant arm, then just levels him with a roaring elbow. Ohno clearly could have won after that elbow, but throws on a spiteful Kassius Clutch to presumably punish insolence. What a run. 

2020 MOTY MASTER LIST