AEW Five Fingers of Death 11/10 - 11/16 Part 2

AEW Collision 11/15/25

FTR/RUSH/Sammy Guevara vs Kevin Knight/Mike Bailey/Juice Robinson/Bandido

MD: An eight man tag can be an opportunity or an excuse.

It can be an opportunity. 

You have eight wrestlers. How do they interact? Both the partners and opponents. I want the camera to linger on what happens when FTR gets into the ring with LFI for the first time (Cash was quick to go slap hands and greet). These are disparate characters, disparate styles, disparate personalities. It's interesting. It makes the world seem more robust. Hiptosses are great. It's not always about hiptosses. I want to see who these people are and what they think about each other. What the hell does Dax think about Rush? That's interesting. Likewise, Juice hanging back and waiting for Bandido to show up so he could do Guns Up with him and then Bandido realizing what he wanted and getting excited and into it. That's interesting. That's compelling. It's vivid and real and immersive. It draws you in.

It's about the narrative opportunities of having more wrestlers and their attributes to work into the match. It opens the door for creative possibilities. You have Rush's intensity, Dax's hard hitting, Bandido's strength, Bailey's agility, Sammy's attitude, Knight's explosiveness, Juice's charisma, and Cash's wild abandon. And that's just one attribute from each of them. The wrestlers can mix and match all of that. Everything can be bigger. The stooge spots can involve more people. You can go for a double heat instead of a single. There are choices for who gets the hot tag, how to do the cut offs. It's more options, more room for creativity. Maybe most of all, it's also a way to further multiple stories at once and seed future interactions and matches.

It can be an excuse.

Eight people. Eight sets of signature spots. Eight guys who can take bumps. The action can flow and flow and flow and never stop. Someone can bump and the next person can be right there, fresh and on his feet, ready to jump right in and get revenge. You can drown the fans with an endless waterfall. Everyone gets their stuff in. Everyone gets to shine. Everyone gets to show off. The spots escalate endlessly. There's no ceiling. There's no bottom. There's no reason to ever stop. 

Except of course there is, because without stopping nothing can have meaning. Without leaning into tag rules, nothing can truly resonate. But it can be an excuse not to do those things, because you can just keep cycling people in and out forever. 

Cleverness for the sake of cleverness, spots for the sake of spots. It seems to be some wrestlers' fondest wish. Endlessly entertaining, almost certainly ephemeral. 

Usually, depending on who's in the match, an eight-man tag in AEW can be one or the other. 

This one, given who was in it, sort of straddled the middle. There was just enough connective tissue. They let things get chaotic, but then they brought it back to the center. There were foundational moments: Knight mocked the heel corner with the tranquilo pose and when he got thrashed by LFI they did it back to him. Sammy teased a swanton early only to leap down and screw with the fans. When he tried the same thing later, it cost him and helped lead towards the hot tag. Speedball hit his moonsault kneedrop in the ring to finally get that hot tag but then wiped out on the apron, clearing him out of the way for the finish. 

There were excessive moments, most especially early chaos which built to FTR eating Juice's stylized punches, Rush trucking him out of nowhere, and simultaneous JetSpeed dives. 

Ultimately, everything came down to Rush and Bandido, then opened back up as everyone got involved for one last bit of excess, only to cycle back around to Rush and Bandido once more for the finish. Moreover, it came back to the characters at play, their familiarity with one another and lack of familiarity with one another, as Rush got shoved into FTR to position himself for a slightly askew 21-Plex. 

If I had my way, I'd prefer something a little more grounded with chaos even more controlled than this, but it's a big tent promotion and sometimes an excuse is what's needed. Thankfully, here, that excuse didn't leave the opportunities on the table like it so often does.

ROH TV 11/13/25

Athena/Billie Starkz vs Hyan/Maya World

MD: Here's what makes pro wrestling great. 

Athena demanded to start the match. She held out her hand to Maya World for her usual insulting left-handed, draping code of honor shake. She immediately clocked her with the magic forearm, absolutely floored her.

And all that? That was Athena selling.

That was her selling the frustration of eating a rare pinfall from Harley Cameron (of all people) during the tag tournament, of having to defend against Harley now, of being eliminated from the tag tournament when she and Mercedes were the favorites, of Kris Statlander getting into her business, of Billie letting her down, of Mercedes not doing her part (and being able to claim that Athena didn't do hers), of not being part of the first Blood & Guts. 

Grievance after grievance all going into that one seething, agitated, impatient shot. 

This was an enhancement match. Hyan and Maya are on the rise but this was to continue Athena's story. She'd sell for their offense, but she'd sell more for the ghosts in her own mind, a burgeoning obsession over Harley. She'd call Harley out within the match, even as she punished Maya or Hyan. She'd take it out on Billie, so distracted and distraught that she'd all but chop her instead of tagging her, would get in a senseless argument which would allow her to get dropkicked from behind.

The secret truth in pro wrestling is that true strength lies in vulnerability, that it's selling which draws the fans in to get behind a babyface and that showing weakness, be it physical, emotional, or moral is how a heel gets heat. So even as Athena ate up Hyan and Maya, she was being eaten up on the inside, and her performance made that clearly evident to the world. 

Meanwhile, it was on Billie, Hyan, and Maya to react. For Billie that was trying to soothe Athena's wounds through inflicting collaborative violence, of showing the emotional impact of Athena's abuse upon her, of being distracted herself. For Hyan and Maya, it was being on their back feet due to the brutality and coming in hot when opportunities arose. 

The end result was an entertaining match which was laser-focused on promoting the title bout to come. And it all hinged on Athena selling something bigger and more complex than a punch or a kick from the second she walked through the curtain to the second the camera faded on her post-match. 

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 6/19 - 6/25 Part 1

AEW Collision 6/24

CM Punk/FTR/Ricky Starks vs Jay White/Juice Robinson/Gunns

MD: This is a pretty fascinating match and I, much like the crowd, am just going to focus on one thing primarily, Punk. The crowd was chanting for him and at him when he wasn't in there. I'm a big proponent that you wrestle to serve the match and that wrestlers that don't do that, who wrestle for themselves, guys like Michaels and Brody, are to be punished with a critcal eye for it. I'm also a believe that you lead the crowd instead of follow it.

That said, there are exceptions. Not every match is built equal, not every moment. Moreover, there are matches down the line. Stan Hansen's a guy who doesn't always have the most interesting match possible with every opponent, but he'll churn through three matches that aren't so interesting in order to keep himself protected to a certain level for the match where the payoff is necessary. While you couldn't look away from it, this match became structurally confusing and structurally confused because the face/heel balance switched to a good degree every time Punk tagged in or out. The finish required the crowd being up for Ricky Starks plowing through the nominal heels with spears before White finally got the best of him, but it also needed the crowd to go up for White catching Punk off the top... right before he caught Starks with the same move to set up the finish. Thankfully, it was a crowd that was going to be hot for everything, but just thinking that through from a narrative level is kind of maddening.

Here's where it absolutely worked, however. Jay White seemed important. Last week, it was all about the build to Punk vs Joe. This week, it was all about the build to Punk vs White. It automatically put him on the same level that Joe was presented at last week. They did a good job of keeping them apart, or only teasing it before paying it off during the long heat during the commercial (which, I guess wasn't heat, but heel-in-peril? Except for it was heat because half the crowd was for Punk... you get why this is tricky, huh?).

As for leading the crowd, Punk rode the wave. He started the match, all the way at the top of the ramp, thinking he'd have to go full heel, even as his partners would lead face and just be like a sports team who have the one controversial player that they have to support and put up with, but it was obvious that half the crowd was with him. He gave them something to celebrate and the detractors something to hate during the first commercial break with the Hogan Legdrop (placing it very carefully during the break). By the end of the match though, he'd cracked the code. At the end of the second commercial break, as he was making a comeback to a White bearhug, he put his arm out to fight when the fans were chanting CM Punk and then dropped it when they chanted Let's Go Switchblade. It was the logical evolution of 97 Bret and more overt than Cena's reactions to the Let's Go Cena/Cena Sucks chants. It also felt like something he was workshopping in the moment. There are probably other things that deserve mention here, like how well Juice and Austin Gunn mesh together as annoying loudmouths or Cash's dive, or how you can't unsee the fact that Dax absolutely refuses to interact with the legal man on the other side when everything breaks down, but this was rightfully all about Punk and partially about White and I'm just going to leave it at that. As for serving something bigger than the match, though? Yes, the moment, but even more than that would be if the finals of the Owen tournament are Punk vs Starks. We may look back at this one differently if that's the case.

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 6/12 - 6/18

AEW Dynamite 6/14

Sting/Darby Allin/Orange Cassidy/Keith Lee vs Mogul Embassy (Swerve Strickland/Brian Cage/Toa Liona/Bishop Kaun)

MD: You watch enough wrestling on TV and you start to think about formatting as it pertains to the structure of the match. Maybe it's because the fact they went thirty to start the show but this had a commercial break during the entrances and then another one in the middle of the match. In order to deal with that, they started hot and then took things down. Most Sting matches tend to be brawls around the arena but this turned into a standard tag getting heat on Darby. Before that though, there was a barrage of Coffin Splashes and Stinger Splashes on Swerve, followed by a Code Red and a tease of the Coffin Drop. You can get away with hitting stuff like that right at the start of a match, especially right at the start of a tag, where a wrestler is fresh and then can recover on the apron, but it's probably something to be done carefully and something done with the specific programming needs of this match in mind. 

Cage made the most of things in his 80s Sting cosplay, coming off as bombastic and larger than life. Kaun hit a spot or two but was a bit of a non-factor while Toa was there to knock people off the apron and play crowd control. I like 2023 Keith Lee as a guy who leverages his size as much as possible while still hitting one or two breathtaking spots. I like that more than when the balance leaned further towards athleticism. Everyone in AEW is athletic. Only a few people are his size. It didn't help here that the athletic spot didn't quite work though. Cassidy didn't do much in this one but break things up and set things up (like the finish for Sting); speaking of setting things up, he also shared the Stundog with Darby, who used it to create the opportunity for the hot tag. They've been teaming lately so it's a shame the announcers didn't pick up on that. It's hard to blame them though, because once things broke down, they really broke down. They probably want to move on but there's still meat on the bone here for a street fight if they needed to fill time right after Forbidden Door.

AEW Collision 6/17

CM Punk/FTR vs Jay White/Juice Robinson/Samoa Joe

MD: Very nice to have the 5th Finger back in action for the first time in ten months, and paired up against Joe for the first time in over 6000 days (at least according to Kevin Kelly). Wrestling is all about anticipation and there was plenty of anticipation here, anticipation even from the beginning of the night to the end, anticipation from the Sports Interview Punk piece from the day before, anticipation from Khan and his media partners making one announcement after the next, week after week (the existence of Collision, that Chicago would be the first venue, that Punk was back, that this was the main event), and anticipation in the match itself: the first lock up between Dax and White, first time Punk would get tagged in, the first encounter with Joe, the hot tag to Cash, the hot tag to Punk, and finally, that final encounter between Joe and Punk, the last one only increasing anticipation for a singles match to come. And of course, there was the anticipation for Punk hitting the GTS after failing to multiple times within the match.

This match, as much as any I'd seen in AEW in a while, certainly had time to breathe. There was quite a bit of back and forth to begin with, double heat, the discipline not to have things fully break down until it was time for Punk's big entrance in the back third of the match, and then an exciting finishing stretch with all the drama you'd want as Punk gasped for air in the Coquina Clutch while Dax and Cash desperately tried to get to him or at least each other in order to do something, anything to turn the tide. Punk didn't seem to have much ring rust at all, though he was buoyed by a familiar opponent in Joe and two very game ones in Juice and especially White. This was the best I've seen Dax look in months. He'd seemed off somehow during the Jarrett feud, maybe still healing up from a slew of injuries but he was sharp and absolutely on point here. Cash is always that. Joe is as comfortable in his own skin after years of portraying a very consistent character as anyone in wrestling and Juice, the absolute definition of trying too hard, somehow manages to transcend that artificiality to succeed more often than not for his efforts. Sometimes you go so far in one direction that you come back around the other way. 

This was a show full of hubris, from Punk's initial interview all the way to not having some sort of big angle at the end, with Dax trying to stand toe to toe with Joe representing it as much as anything else in the match, but to have faith in a great wrestling match to be enough to carry the load? Well, that's the kind of hubris I suppose I can get behind.

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 1/9 - 1/15

AEW Dynamite 1/11

Bryan Danielson vs. Konosuke Takeshita

MD: Takeshita's raw physical abilities makes him sort of anything for anyone. Eddie Kingston had a very specific match that he wanted to have with him. Adam Page did as well. So did Mox and Claudio. I think his own pro-wrestling instincts are a bit much for my tastes, but I'd love to see what some of the other 5FoD like Punk or Dustin might do with him. I think it was pretty clear to anyone paying attention what Danielson wanted, someone to push him as far as possible so they could have a high octane, hard hitting match. That's exactly what he got. 

Coming in, knowing that, I was ok with the end product, give or take a few nitpicks, but overly impressed by a few points as well. For instance, I think they filled the time on the top rope during the commercial break and ending with that amazing lariat off the top exceptionally well. Timing was perfect; you didn't know where it'd end up and were happily surprised by the eventual place; it never felt cooperative; it always felt perilous. I liked the little bits of mat sections early. Takeshita's strength and flexibility meant that Danielson could really stretch, both in his own bridging and with the Romero special into the dragon sleeper. The one place where it fell apart was the ugly spot on the floor, and even then, Danielson recovered beautifully at first by selling his leg. It would have been even more beautiful if it was all a ruse and, after the knees up on the flipping senton in, he had dropped the selling completely. Instead, he dropped it conveniently, not selling it after that spot to set up the LeBell lock, selling it immediately thereafter, and then dropping it for the rest of the match, including after he landed on his feet after the German. It would have worked way better as a feint but obviously, it's a lot to keep track in the moment. Not every conversation about Danielson has to be about whether he's the best in the world or not, I suppose.

Instead, it was nice to see Danielson against a handpicked opponent, getting time and fully flexing his pro wrestling interests. On some level, I miss a more mat-based, hold-based, Danielson, one that would really dismantle an opponent, but it's still thrilling to watch him do what he wants to do most.  

AEW Rampage 1/13

Darby Allin vs. Juice Robinson

MD: This felt like the match needed for the specific moment. It was a reset after the ladder match with a big bloodbath to come. It was a nice little title match too. I've heard from a lot of people that Juice is better positioned as a babyface but I think he adds a nice bit of contrast and there's a real sense of escalation in his offense as the match goes on. They started out on the mat, giving it a bit of a title match feel, shifted with one huge bump by Darby, and then went into an extended control period by Juice which was constant and consistent. Darby is a guy who doesn't necessarily need to get in a lot of hope spots because the fans are behind him and because half of the joy of his matches is watching him take stuff. When there is a comeback and a cutoff, it means all the more for it. Juice started with the double axe handle building to the sentons (which he went for initially too early to start of the match and then paid off later) and ultimately the Harlem Sidekick. When he couldn't put Darby away, because who can, he went to the top, made a mistake, and Darby took the win. Just a good straightforward match which gave Juice a lot of room to stretch, gave Darby another win (a bunch in a very short period of time) and got the crowd recalibrated for what was to come next.

Malakai Black/Brody King vs. Eddie Kingston/Ortiz

MD: Lots of moving parts here. A lot like the Cassidy vs Sabian match from last week, they did a good job of playing out the story with the actual ringwork. AEW's roster is a dual-edged sword. You'll get Eddie wrestling relatively short enhancement tags on the webshows (even if sometimes the opponents have been great) and then you suddenly realize that you never knew you wanted him to face off against Malakai Black. This was more of a tease than a real payoff, but it was a hell of a tease, culminating with the drop into the seated position and King interjecting to lead into the commercial break and the heat. Eddie kept coming back, kept getting assists from Ortiz, kept refusing to tag. I'm not sure anyone in wrestling today could have portrayed this level of stubbornness, defiance, and toughness than Eddie. His face was visibly banged up; he kept throwing backfists wildly; he stood tall and foolish and prideful and people believed in him and suspended their disbelief and let themselves get frustrated at him and hopeful for him. That's what Eddie Kingston could do. Everyone else played their role perfectly, especially Ortiz who took it to Brody at the start and worked the apron like an all time tag worker and including Julia with picture perfect timing and a resonating scream when a lot of people were probably expecting the mist. I'm glad this is getting time and look forward to see how it all plays out.

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New Japan Pro Wrestling: G1 Special in San Francisco 7/7/18

ER: I loosely considered going to this event, just because it was an hour away, but the card wasn't too interesting to me and the prices were way too prohibitive (Tim said the cheap seats were like $60, which - even if that's not true - fully prevented me from even looking further into attending this show), but I'm not someone with a very active social calendar so once I found out this show was airing on television, I figured I can spare the time to watch it. We were at a BBQ earlier, came home and it was literally 4 minutes in, figured it was a sign that I had to ruin the rest of my evening.

Sho/Yoh/Gedo/Yoshihashi/Rocky Romero vs. King Haku/Tama Tonga/Tanga Loa/Chase Owens/Yujiro Takahashi

ER: I like that they start with Haku, but it's pretty silly to have him bumping around right out of the gate for Yoshihashi. But this whole match isn't too interesting. Barely 5 minutes in and Takahashi is settling into a chinlock, which should absolutely NEVER happen when you have 10 guys in a match. Rocky Romero threw some light shoulderblocks, Gedo threw nice punches, Haku dishes a nice old man piledriver, Haku's kids were hardly in it snd they would have been the best parts of the match, Sho/Yoh had a decent double team section, but this was super short and the definition of inconsequential.

Minoru Suzuki/Zack Sabre Jr/ vs. Tomohiro Ishii/Toru Yano

ER:  I have next to no use for Yano, which is a shame as he really muddles up the works here. I love Sabre but seeing him do his thing against Yano is just the least interesting opponent. Things get better once Ishii is scraping his boot all over Suzuki's face and head, but their opening forearm exchange is uber uninteresting. Sabre comes up with a couple fun ways to block Yano's horseshoe, but this match also feels super inconsequential. Everything has so far felt like guys goofing off until it's time for the finish, which is a terrible way to start a show. Maybe there were people there live that were super excited to see Yano's schtick (he does clearly have fans), but I would feel majorly ripped off at this point.

Marty Scurll/Hangman Page vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi/KUSHIDA

ER: When you see two straight clunkers, and the next thing you hear is "Coming up next, Marty Scurll", that's when you know that you've made a series of awful choices in your evening. We were at a BBQ later, and that was okay, and now we're here and this is less than okay. This whole show feels like a house show, with wrestlers who don't understand how to make a house show interesting. WWE house shows are some of the more interesting and fun shows I've been to, and these guys all seem to think they're really charming and can survive on coasting, but most guys on this show actually have really awful schtick. I think Page and Scurll's schtick is "our offense hits really poorly" then they're actually really good at it. Page's shooting star shoulderblock off the apron is a top contender for Dumbest Wrestling Moves Ever Performed. Page's early 2000s indie offense finishes things, and this show is a heaping crap pile so far. Matches have all ended abruptly and without much interesting happening, an easy 0 for 3 so far.

Jeff Cobb vs. Hirooki Goto

ER: I have higher hopes for this one, and it delivers early with some nice shoulderblocks and one of the flat out coolest belly to belly suplexes any of us have ever seen. Cobb catches Goto, spins around a couple times to find his angle, ducks down into a deep squat, then throws him straight overhead. There's some crazy strength involved here, and it looked awesome. Cobb also takes a nice posting on the floor, and I'm into this. Cobb keeps things interesting, breaking free of a Goto headlock to hit a nice impactful dropkick, nice leaping forearm in the corner, and a cool swinging Saito suplex. Goto has some early 2000s indie offense of his own, and there are many guys in modern New Japan who feel like Ric Blade, just dropping guys sloppily onto his own knee or clotheslining someone stupidly into his own leg or slamming his leg in a car door to own the libs or some stupid shit. I liked the Cobb running wild portions of this, and the Goto control segments where much less interesting. This was still the only thing worth watching so far.

Sanada/EVIL vs. Young Bucks

ER: We run through a lot of crowd pleasing stuff early, a spot where each legal man knocks the opposing partner off the apron, a series of missed elbow drops and sentons, a four person submission, just a bunch of guys working a series of bits. I wish Sanada and EVIL were a little more aggressive while beating down the Bucks. Sanada is a guy I like but he seems a little tentative here. Nick is super smooth in all his work around the apron, but the NJ guys seem a little slow on the timing spots. We still get the timing stuff delivered, there's just a little hesitation. I like Sanada's dragon sleeper giant swing, that's a great spot, but he's arriving to his mark too early to take Bucks' spots and it's pulling back the curtain on this seeming like too much of a moves exhibition. Still I like Nick using a big rope running flipping crossbody to take out EVIL on the floor. Nick is also good at leaping into EVIL's German suplexes and take a big silly fireman's carry/sit out powerbomb, taking it all flat backed so it really landed with a dull thud. The superkicks to the ref were done well, there were a couple nice saves down the stretch, this was a good enough match, but the structure and pacing could have been better.

Bushi/Tetsuya Naito vs. Kazuchika Okada/Will Ospreay

ER: A not bad tag, with a few guys who are bigger than this tag, and everybody kind of works this the same way Misawa might take off a tag 4th from the top at a non-major show. The key is that most people are working this show as very much a non-major show. Ospreay has come off like a big deal recently and comes off pretty low-tier here, as he's primarily matched up with Bushi, but he should be way higher on the card than Bushi. Naito throws a couple nice kicks, and Ospreay takes Bushi's stuff with a nice snap. All of these matches feel like they're taking place a half hour into an episode of Friday Night Smackdown, but specifically a Smackdown match that's worked by people that aren't appearing on an upcoming PPV, and are given orders to not show up the upcoming PPV.

But we're getting a lot of Eddie Trunk commercials.

Dragon Lee vs. Hiromu Takahashi

ER: I'm shocked that they aren't constantly referring to this as the new generation Rey/Psicosis, seems like an easy get that JR would go to often. And we start with a wild Lee rana from the ring to Hiromu on the apron, and follow that up with a fast Lee tope. You just kind of have to decide whose offense you like more and root for the match that way, because there are going to be several times where you're annoyed that someone bounced back to his feet too quickly. Takahashi breaks out some crazy stuff, hitting hard on dropkicks, launching an especially nutty dropkick off the apron, then hitting the big standing senton to the floor. It's a greatest hits collection, but the crowd is a greatest hits crowd. By the time the two of them are trading big German suplexes, I don't care anyway. "These are restaurant quality suplexes, I assure you," says JR, and nobody has any fucking clue what he's assuring us of. You'll care even less about the forearm trading, but Lee will fly stupidly into the turnbuckles off a suplex. The match reaches full retard status when Lee bounces Takahashi headfirst across the mat on a package suplex, I mean literally headfirst, bounced off the mat. Doesn't matter too much, he won a minute later, off of what looked like one of the weakest moves of the match. That appears to be the New Japan way. "Do a bunch of dangerous shit, win with a weak lariat or a light backbreaker."

Juice Robinson vs. Jay White

ER: This works out of the gate because both guys are cool getting thrown violently into the ring barricades, with Juice especially flying hard into it. White needs someone willing to violently throw themselves into things, or else his whole being does not work, but luckily Juice appears to be this guy, throwing himself into the turnbuckles on a suplex and is good at taking a beating. Juice has a broken bandaged up left hand, and he's a southpaw, so we get a lot of stuff with White being a dick and going after the hand. On the floor and Juice takes a nice bump into the post, and then eats a nasty snap suplex into the barricade that actually knocks JR out of his seat, and that leads to Josh Barnett getting into the ring. White plays it nicely and both JR and Barnett are weirdly swearing on commentary, but White was hilarious acting like a smug prick for knocking over JR. Getting another 19 count out spot is a bit much on the same show (there was literally one in the previous match), but Juice is killing himself to make this match work, and White's cold heel demeanor is working off it. The stuff around Juice's left hand is a little too hokey though. Normally I'm a big fan of an injured taped up body part unable to be used, and the heel opponent using that to his advantage, but they integrate it a couple of really clunky ways using Red Shoes (Red Shoes acting too broad and hammy on a spot? Weird), it all could have been stronger. We do get a couple good nearfalls, and it was nice seeing Juice get the win. It was pretty easily the best match on the card so far, but there has also been a lot of very bad wrestling on the card so far.

Cody vs. Kenny Omega

ER: I appreciate the pomp, love Cody coming out in this grade school Roman cape, accompanied by Brandi and some lesser thans to carry him to the ring. His act works best with Brandi, and even if she's not great at ringside like Zelina, her presence can still be strong. It's great to see Cody doing totally shithead things like pulling her in front of him so Omega doesn't finish a dive. We get a lot of brawling on the floor, and it's pretty good. Guys have been taking nasty throws into railings tonight, feels like those things aren't tied down in any way. Juice in the prior match looked like he was bursting through them like the Kool Aid Man. But Kenny brings in a table and my god does it look incredibly painful when he does a flying double stomp to Cody. I was digging it up to this point, but they lost me with some of the trading and overkill, seems like Omega really wants to make his big thigh slap knee look as weak as possible, he throws it out so often and it can look great, but it never feels like a nearfall move anymore. You get nice bits of stuff, like a big flip dive from Omega and a nice headscissors, but I'm sick of stuff like trading dragon suplexes. Almost 20 years ago when I was sitting at home playing Virtual Pro Wrestling 2 and blowing off classes, the dragon suplex felt like a move that nobody could possibly even survive, let alone kick out from.

A ladder gets involved and I like some of the fighting around the ladder, liked the ladder used as a prop that you could get slammed into, but the climbing stuff didn't work for me, even though the two craziest spots in the match all happened because of them climbing that damn ladder. Cody's superplex  off the ladder was a thing of beauty, and I liked how we forgot about the table still sitting out on the floor, unbroken, waiting in position. I definitely could have done without the involvement of Red Shoes and his acting abilities, and they made sure all the worst elements of that dude were on display for the final 10 minutes. And I still cannot stand the one-winged angel, the fact that when an opponent looks like he can be put away Omega needs to go "Cool but let me try to bury my head inside his ass for a bit first", and as I'm talking about how stupid the move is, Omega does something far more violent and powerbombs Cody from the ring "through" the table on the floor, but the powerbomb falls a little short and Cody basically bounces off the table and straight to the floor. I enjoyed the drama with Brandi putting her body in front of Cody's to stop a V-Trigger, but really could have done without some last minute elbow trade offs. The underhook piledriver looked good and is far more plausible than burying your head in someone's ass until they're vertically up on your shoulders, but it was fine. The match went long and to their credit it didn't feel too stretched out. Behind Juice/White it was definitely the best of what's left.


ER: Well I'm not bummed at all that I didn't pay money to see this live, but the presentation was simple and nice, and at least the final 3 matches felt like the workers were treating this like a big show. A few of the big stars were there but clearly didn't show up, and I think I like that Juice match because of that. We get a bunch of guys taking the night off, and Juice shows up and throws himself wildly through guardrails and into suplexes. An awesome performance, with some unexpectedly fun Josh Barnett threats right in the middle of the match! NJPW bringing in Barnett to work a series would be more interesting to me than most of their options. But I genuinely loved the beatdown to close out this show. That was arguably my favorite thing we got to see. Tama Tonga is awesome and one of the more underutilized guys on the roster, one of the NJ guys I actually go out of my way to see. Tama and Tanga looked great dismantling everyone, and even though he's 60 Haku has an undeniable presence and looked intense while stomping guys out. Haku would be an awesome addition as the third man in trios, and I'm really curious to see some high level Tama matches, see how he can step it up with the big opportunity.

So, overall I wouldn't recommend the show. But the big singles matches all delivered (and even though I got bored with Lee/Takahashi, I guarantee most in attendance got exactly the Lee/Takahashi match they wanted, so good for them) and the show ending angle couldn't have been hotter, so it was a show that definitely got better as it went on.

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AIW Death Rowe 1/19/18

Shane Mercer vs. Matt Justice

ER: Mercer is like if Sheamus mated with Petey Williams, and Justice is like if Drew Galloway mated with Baron Corbin. And both of those things have their benefits. There are a couple drawbacks of the Sheamus/Petey Williams mixture. If your water has over 10 Petey Williams parts per billion, your wrestling DNA is going to be at least somewhat tainted. But he's a compact guy with genuine power, but also gets a bit too married to a sequence. He hit an awesome press slam spot that saw him holding Justice up with one arm, but there was also a clunky planned sequence where he got suplexed into the ropes upside down, and was supposed to hold on, but he didn't catch the turnbuckles properly. So then he stayed "stuck" in the turnbuckles as he scrambled to go through with the planned spot while people groaned. But he's pale so his chest turned bright red on chops, and Justice throws a lot of chops (and some great headbutts). Justice hits a nice shotgun kick and the finish looks big time, with Justice hitting a flying kneedrop to the back of Mercer's head while Mercer is bent at the waist. It was like a modern indy version of a Cattle Branding, looked cool.

Parker Pierce/Big Twan Tucker vs. Weird World (Alex Kellar/"Weird Body" Evan Adams)

ER: Weird Body is probably my favorite wrestler who isn't actually very good, but I'll always watch him! Match was okay and had some surprises. Kellar has gotten better and while he isn't as funny as White Mike, he hits harder. Late in the match he hits a tope that's ugly when compared to the oldest luchador tope, but points for hurling your belly and dirty tights through the ropes onto another human. Pierce and Tucker work a frat gimmick, and Pierce has a good potentially hateable charisma, like a Chris Dickinson ceiling. He's not there, but his potential for improvement is big, and he did things I liked: drops a big leg (in tandem with a Big Twan splash to Weird Body), bullied Adams around, dropped him with some indy "I drop your face on my knee", and as Adams is sitting upright and stunned Pierce shoves him over to pin. The shove was a nice, Finlay-esque move, those kind of things are good signs. Weird Body beatdowns aren't ever really as good in practice as they seem like they would be on paper. He does get tossed with a fallaway slam and eats a splash/legdrop, but you almost expect the beating on him to be more violent and it usually isn't. He has no meat on his bones to absorb bumps, I wouldn't want to get tossed around much either.

Frankie Flynn/Magnum CK vs. Chase Oliver/Tre Lamar

ER: Good match, I liked what all four guys brought. Flynn is a good Jimmy Jacobs lite, sells really well, took a kneeling rana really cool and made it look like he lawndarted himself into the mat, a guy worth going out of your way to watch. Magnum CK is this big oaf-y Davey Boy Smith Jr./Matthew Rhys on the Americans looking guy, who apparently had been out of wrestling for 8 years (his comeback promo made it sound like he was dealing with alcoholism?), and has an all time great ring entrance: He comes out in his show cape, arms extended, and he proceeds to walk all around ringside with arms fully extended, which means his outer hand is just lightly slapping and pie-facing everybody in the front row. He wrestles like Bret Hart with a dash of John Tatum, so he'll hit a nice diving elbow off the middle rope and hit a legsweep, but he'll also pinball between punches and flop face first hard to the mat. Oliver and Lamar are a cut above your typical timed sexy dance fighters, they throw decent punches and have cool tandem offense (loved Lamar armdragging Oliver into a a slumped-in-the-corner Flynn), and they peak with each hitting tandem dives, Oliver moonsaulting to the floor while Lamar crosses paths with him diving diagonally past the ringpost. I mean holy crap, crossing paths on a dive is just flat out crazy. They weren't operating with a ton of space, like the fucking Blue Angels of wrestling. Everyone added to this, went a nice length, real satisfying tag.

Johnathan Wolf vs. Malcolm Monroe III

ER: My, this went on for quite awhile, didn't it? Both guys have some ideas, and both guys want to use every single one of their ideas smack dab in the middle of an 8 match card. I thought Wolf had some neat things, especially liked his aloof dickhead habit of tying his hair back in a loose bun whenever he had some down time, including kicking and stomping at Monroe while doing so. Monroe slips up on a couple of the dancier spots, but breaks out some crazy ideas, even hits a big moonsault off the top into the crowd and takes a huge running powerbomb into the guardrail. But he relies on Wolf's recklessness, and seeming willingness to get dumped on his head by stupid flipping piledrivers. We had a lot of piledrivers in this match that didn't mean a whole lot. Monroe did a lot of annoying death sell, only to be up hopping around moments later. We had an amusing moment of both landing kicks and strikes at the same time and both falling on their face. And we also had a freaking flip piledriver off the top, that then left Wolf standing on his feet swaying back and forth, waiting to take another flip piledriver variation, like he's waiting to take a Fatality in Mortal Kombat. They both had good ideas, they both had bad tendencies. I'd like to see them reigned in.

Colby Redd/Derek Director/Eddy Only vs. Garrison King/AJ Gray/Joshua Bishop

ER: AIW seems to be able to just throw guys together in a multiman and have it deliver, and this delivered. The former team is the rest of The Production, and the latter team we saw in the great 2017 AIW 10 man. A trios like this can play to everyone's strengths, and I thought this mostly did. Director was maybe exposed too much, but his good stuff was good. Eddy Only has a great dirtbag look, he could be the roadie for Ugly Ducklings (if the Ugly Ducklings were a Banana Splits style band and went out on tour). He looks like someone in an action movie, where our hero gets into a big fight with a bunch of truckers at the bar, and Only is a tiny scrappy trucker who our hero laughs off before realizing Only is the crazy trucker who overindulges on speed cut with bleach. He bumps big and moves quick, and I like how people somewhat used him as a weapon, like Bishop powerbombing him to the floor onto everyone. King also bumps big and moves quick, loved how he took a Colby Redd suplex, loved the section with The Production beating him down. AJ Gray is a Wee Willie Mack and hits a big tope at one point, a crazy tornillo to the floor. Throwing together a roster for a fun 15 minute 6 man is one of my favorite things in wrestling; I love 2000-2007 NOAH trios, obviously WAR trios, it's just a cool easy always fun match if you have the depth. And AIW has rarely disappointed me in that department.

Dominic Garrini vs. Juice Robinson

PAS: New Japan and NXT are two of my biggest wrestling blindspots, so I had seen hardly any Juice Robinson, but I will watch pretty much any Garrini match, and this was a ton of fun. Robinson comes in crowbarishly and it forces Garrini to throw big shots too. I liked the story of this match with Garrini scouting the bigger star and having counters, while Juice doesn't know anything about Dominic. It felt like Garrini had answers to all of Robinson big moves, he countered his big senton to a cross armbreaker, avoided his kicks and countered the Pulp Friction into a wastelock throw and nasty armbar for the tap. Robinson really hit hard here, big chops, and a couple of huge clotheslines, basically working this like a dominant guy, that dominance really made the upset victory work. Dom has started out 2018 on fire, and I imagine he is going to have a big year.

ER: I'm a big Juice fan. Juice is a guy I really liked in NXT. Easily one of the best workers there, and he really made his condescending dirty hippie heel character work, and I’ve always like his wrestling style. He doesn’t skimp on little things like stomach kicks, he throws a variety of nice punches, he hits way harder than you might guess by looking at him, has some weird offense that he makes look better than others (his standing spin kick doesn’t seem like it should land effectively, but he always makes it look like a kill shot), he’s just a quality guy. Garrini is someone who I think will be good, and has obviously been a major contributor to some great stuff already. I do think he has a tendency to look a little robotic during strike exchanges, and some of his set ups feel like something I would be more critical of if they were done by someone I didn’t like. But I like Garrini, and I like the skillset he brings to a match, and I think these two are good dance partners who I had never actually pictured dancing together. Juice has kind of a cocky style without always being overtly cocky, which is the perfect kind of guy to go up against someone with legit submission skills. Every time Juice would leave a limb out there or go into guard for a pinfall I kept waiting for Garrini to snap the bear trap. Juice bumps big on lariats but dishes nice jabs, that big spin kick, a nice powerbomb out of the corner, and they work some cool stuff like Garrini locking on a standing guillotine but eventually getting slammed by Juice. I love those moments in Riddle or Garrini matches, where their opponent leaps into something only to get caught in a sub, and they’re even better when they actually incorporate the opponent’s regular offense. I rarely see them used as “trying to sunset flip Rikishi” or “trying to powerbomb Kidman”, they’re usually pretty smart. Juice has a nice senton so it makes sense when Garrini gets his knees up and locks in an armbar. The finish is the same and it’s satisfying, Juice getting caught in another armbar and immediately tapping. Fun match that solidified what I like about both guys.

43. To Infinity and Beyond (Cheech/Colin Delaney) vs. Philly Marino Experience (Philly Collins/Marino Tenaglia) vs. Young Studs (Bobby Beverly/Eric Ryan) vs. Excellence Personified (Dr. Daniel C. Rockingham/Brian Carson)

PAS: AIW has mastered these multi man tag matches, and I really think To Infinity and Beyond are the glue that holds them together. This is really early PME, they have really developed in a great team, but this match was 18 months ago and they are still pretty seamlessly integrated into the match. This is the most I have enjoyed Dr. Dan, as he cuts out the comedy and just takes bumps. I think TIAB are just conducting a complex amount of traffic. Philly Collins's fat boy moonsault to the floor is one of the more impressive highspots around, he gets great height and lands with tubby force. Brian Carson has a crazy bump to the floor where he cracks his head on the top of the metal post, we get a bunch of cool double teams, and some really well timed cut offs. Just such an enjoyable bit of craziness.

ER: Yep, this ruled, easily my favorite match of the show. I'm never going to know/remember why I didn't watch this match with the rest of the show. AIW has my favorite tag scene in wrestling, and they do these wild action multi mans SO much better than anyone else, and Delaney/Cheech really do seem to be the consistent denominator in all of them. But this match was filled with star performances. Yes, Cheech and Delaney are constantly a part of that, and seem to trigger each new momentum change, while looking explosive as hell. Delaney runs into guys faster and with harder elbows than anyone in this thing, he has gotten so good in the past couple years. PME looked great too, with Marino dropping a great underdog babyface performance. Every time he would come in it lead to something exciting. Philly built to his big moments nicely, and that moonsault to the floor was like a strike that sends every single pin exploding backwards. But my favorite thing he did might have been when he got accidentally tied up in the ropes, to set up Delaney's sliding German. I'm a big fan of guys finding cool ways to set up someone else's trademark offense, anything other than just standing there and waiting. Brian Carson takes the bump of the match, missing an avalanche and hitting the ringpost, and then continuing to tumble over the top and off the ring steps to the floor. Young Studs looked good as ever, Beverly delivers his slams super fast and Ryan threw the best punches of the match, and threw them often. This whole thing was 8 guys running hard and running into each other, taking big bumps, finding fun ways to break up pins, just the best, most thoroughly mapped out tag. These matches are the best versions of those Dragons Gate scrambles that got acclaim over a decade ago.

Keith Lee vs. Raymond Rowe

ER: This was Rowe's final indy match before going to NXT, so I figured I should check it out as I like him and obviously like Lee, and they went for an epic, and several big parts of the epic worked, but it also dragged something fierce. The match was a little over 25 minutes and felt about 45. To somebody who has somehow not seen either of these guys work before, both move like you would not expect them to move. They both have explosive speed and both hit hard, so you get this neat mix of quick bursts ending in meaty thumps. This takes awhile to get going, as they really milked the opening, milked the first lockup, milked all of it. By the time Rowe went for a handshake and decked Lee (which Lee sold in the ropes with a nice amusing cross-eyed sell) and they started trading their big moves, every move was a peak, and the wait time until the next move was a big valley. I don't want to sound like I expect go go go highspots in every match, but these two both have impressive gas tanks for their size and probably could have crushed a 13 minute sprint, but we ended up with a lot of lying around and a lot of shocked reactions at the referee when a move did not get the 3 count.

But I like how both guys move so there's a lot of pleasure just seeing them interact, seeing a big Lee leapfrog/dropdown/dropkick, seeing Rowe superman punch Lee around ringside, seeing these giant dudes throw each other. We got tons of elbows and knees, and some cool blocking of those moves: Rowe starts blocking Lee elbows with his head and then clunks him in the chest with a headbutt, Lee starts blocking Rowe's knees with his forearms and sinks a few nasty knees to the gut himself. Rowe hits Lee with a mammoth uranage, and I liked Lee screaming on the way down. Rowe starts dishing huge running knee's to Lee's face, almost winding up like he's hitting a short arm clothesline, but nailing a kneeling Lee in the jaw. We even get Rowe hitting a flipping piledriver on Lee for a 2 count, which looked spectacular and really should have ended the match. But we kind of drag out the nearfalls and the finish is a kinda fun twist, as Rowe hits the Death Rowe knee to the back of Lee's head and hits a tornado elbow...only to have Lee timberrrrrrr down on top of him for the 3 count. I like the use of "man trying to reach for one last free snack from the vending machine, ending with the vending machine crushing him" parable. The match had some weird moments, like Lee stopping the match to tell the ringside fans to feast their eyes on the specimen of Keith Lee, and Rowe stopping the match to tell the crowd "Let me feed off your energy". And the proceedings just dragged on too long, though I understand them wanting to go big on Rowe's last show. An enjoyable match, but not as big as I hoped.


ER: Really fun show. The AIW roster is really awesome, cool mix of guys, definitely a crew I'm going to keep seeking out. Even when the matches aren't "MOTY" level, they still deliver. There's a bunch of match-ups I want to see with these guys. Juice/Garrini is an easy choice for our 2018 MOTY list though, totally delivering on a match that I hadn't thought of as happening. You will certainly see more AIW stuff written up here, that's for sure.

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New Japan Pro Wrestling: Strong Style Evolved 3/25/18

I'm planning on doing an Segunda Caida X00 this year, whether that number be 100, 200, 300, or what. So I have to watch a lot of wrestling, including stuff that I don't think I'll like a lot. I need to keep an open mind and look for names that might eek onto the list. This is a show New Japan is running in Long Beach, and while I'm not a big modern NJ fan, I like the idea of a non-WWE fed coming into America now and again. It can only be a good thing for wrestling. So the show is on TV, baseball season hasn't started yet, and I forgot about WWE Fastlane (thus no love blog), so I may as well make up a Sunday.

Christopher Daniels/Scorpio Sky/Frankie Kazarian vs. Rocky Romero/Sho/Yoh

ER: Well this write up is looking like a dumb fucking choice. I don't like a lot of guys in this match, but I guess I relate to it. All the Americans are people that I first started watching and seeing live in 2000/2001, going on road trips with friends to Southern CA. They're all older, balder, still doing the same thing they were doing nearly 20 years ago. So I am them. Older, balder, still writing about pro wrestling, still seeing the same guys. Life is a straight line. All guys do something I like, some things I don't. Kazarian doesn't shortchange stomach kicks and gets great height on a legdrop. Sadly he majorly botched a springboard legdrop off the freaking bottom rope. Once he slipped he just hopped on one leg to finish the spot. He at least sold a knee injury on the apron for a bit, so that was a decent bounceback. Yoh is a decent face in peril, Scorpio throws a better right hand than I remember, Daniels is still doing the same offense he did in '99, but he hits a nutty split legged moonsault to the floor, throwing himself into the barrier. This was kept short, and was fine.

Juice Robinson/David Finlay vs. Gedo/Hirooki Goto

ER: This was a fun one. Juice is a mean dude who would be the best possible member of a Breezango trios. His kicks land, he's got good punches, a high senton, and he always surprises with stiff shots. Here he busts open Goto's mouth with a hard back elbow. Goto shows more personality than I have maybe ever seen from him, after he gets his mouth busted. Something snaps and he is suddenly intense. Finlay is never the wrestler I want him to be, and with that last name he won't ever be, but he's a good fired up babyface. His hot tag was great, tons of energy, great flying back elbow, good presence on that pasty bod. Gedo is always a favorite of mine, and we get typical great Gedo punches and a superkick that looks like it still matters. This was quick and fiery, I dug it.

Davey Boy Smith Jr./Lance Archer vs. Toru Yano/Chuck Taylor

ER: Over/Under on how many time's JR compares KES to Hansen/Brody? 4. I think 4 is fair. KES are too goofy, Yano is too goofy, serious Taylor is still too goofy. KES are never as hoss as I'd like them to be, and I hate the look of orange spray tan, blonde spiky hair, big doopy mouth guard. Smith still moves so stiffly around the ring. He never looks comfortable in there. Archer has a face I dislike on sight, but he hits hard on a shoulderblock, and he and Smith can at least sometimes act like big guys. I don't have much use for Yano, and I still can't buy Taylor as a competitive heavyweight.

Marty Scurll/Cody vs. Tanga Loa/Tama Tonga

ER: This match has one of my favorite NJ guys (Tama Tonga) opposite my probably least favorite NJ guy (Marty Scurll), so I know which team I'm rooting for. Scurll stinks. I hate how JR always compares him to Marty Jones, Regal, Finlay, it's gross. Scurll always comes off so hack. He attempts a Regal-esque spinning wristlock sequence and clunked his way through it, getting hung up twice. Tonga is awesome, though, like the Usos working a main event Roman Reigns style. His exchanges are fast, he throws nice strikes, goes down like a shot on a Scurll superkick, misses a Superman punch in style, I always dig him. Loa is good too, never really got a chance to do much in WWE, but he hits hard and has a nice moveset, really sinks that spear. Both Tonga and Loa take offense well. Cody still doesn't do a lot for me, but his ring confidence is far bigger now than ever, and that counts for something. Scurll stomped Tonga's elbow nice a couple times. I'll give him credit for that, at least.

Hiromu Takahashi/BUSHI/SANADA/Tetsuya Naito vs. Ryusuke Taguchi/Dragon Lee/KUSHIDA/Hiroshi Tanahashi

ER: Boy with all these multi-mans they must be trying to use 40 guys on one show. We're 5 matches in and we've had 26 guys on the card. It's a lot. This match felt like it should have been better. It's impossible to have a bad 8 man, really with almost anybody involved. Everyone has to be in so little that you can really play to strengths. This wasn't a bad match, but it had guys with a lot of strengths, and should have been better. Takahashi and Lee cram a lot of ideas into their singles matches, yet here only get a couple quick moments together, nothing really memorable (though Takahashi does chuck Lee into the turnbuckles on a wild suplex). I like "Tanahashi is injured" matches, and they kind of start going after his arm but it doesn't go anywhere. The stretch run dance partner trade off was really fun, one guy after the next running in to do a move or two before getting taken out by the next guy. Those moments are always fun with talented guys. Taguchi impressed me here, liked his energy, liked his heel hook roll through, liked a couple of his hip attacks. I was similarly impressed by BUSHI. But this should have had more oomph to it.

Jushin Liger vs. Will Ospreay

ER: I was optimistic about this one, as Liger is great enough to reign in the excesses of Ospreay, and Ospreay is talented enough to be reigned in. And I liked the story they went with of Liger working up to big time the hot rising star and surprise him. Liger is aggressive and nails a somersault dive off the apron, crushes Ospreay on the floor with a brainbuster, drops him with a Liger bomb. We get more intrigue when Ospreay lands funny on his left knee and I honestly can't tell how legit the injury is. He still does a bunch of crazy flying stuff, but he sells his knee the whole damn time, even during flying moves, and I don't know if Ospreay's selling is THAT good. There was some impressive attention paid to his knee injury here. He also takes a great bump off a shotei, with Liger hooking him under the chin, and Ospreay looked like a cartoon cat running into a laundry line that he didn't see. The match ends a lot shorter than I expected, about 10 minutes, not sure if that's the overstuffed card or if they went home earlier because of that pesky real/fake leg injury. But we get a couple nice nearfalls before the sudden finish, and I thought the match was real good. Ospreay even cuts a good promo post-match, giving credit to Liger but also acting big for his britches. He gets a good reaction by challenging Mysterio too, which could be a fun match. But then they have Scurll come out and cheapshot Ospreay and rip Mysterio's mask off. Did we really need to give Scurll that much of a rub? Spend your time on other guys.

Zack Sabre Jr./Minoru Suzuki vs. Tomohiro Ishii/Kazuchika Okada

ER: Okada just doesn't to it for me, but there's enough personality in this match to really make it work. And sure enough, cocky doofus ZSJ is awesome and I love that I'm now the high vote on the guy. Seeing he and Suzuki put a bunch of dickhead tandem submissions on Ishii while the crowd chants "Fuck you, Sabre" is joy. You see, Suzuki is too cool for them to be mad at, they would want to be friends with him and hope Suzuki thought they were also cool. But Sabre is just a hateable mug who should be pummeled. He stomps Ishii to the rhythm of their chant claps, and continues to poke the bear by rubbing his boot laces in Ishii's eyes, kicking him condescendingly, rubbing it in while Ishii is on the mat. When Ishii snags him and lifts him into a deadlift German it's a great moment. I love ZSJ using Okada as his submission jungle gym. Okada can often come off Polar Express-eyed and this makes him show some emotion, a little fight and a little desperation. Okada throws some embarrassing elbows when it's his turn to fight, really disappointing stuff. I hear Sabre get called out a lot for being too skinny, but he's practically the same size as Okada, and I don't hear that complaint about Okada. I don't get it. I think people just like to hate Sabre, which he should get credit for. Sabre continually doesn't learn his lesson. After a (too long) Suzuki/Ishii who-can-hit-harder contest, Sabre is back and mockingly kicking Ishii. Ishii catches a kick and steps in with a great headbutt and stiff powerbomb. Ishii is okay but is he as good as even Kazuyuki Fujita? Is he even the best Japanese guy working a "Man with no neck" gimmick? He's nowhere near Masa Saito. I don't know if he's better than Fujita. But I do really like how Sabre and Ishii match up, loved their July 2017 singles match, love how Sabre acts around Ishii. Sabre taps him with a great tangled up grapevine, puts Okada in an octopus hold after (but does not tap him during the match, which would have felt like a huge deal), even tosses Okada's title on the floor after the match. That's an Okada singles match I would watch.

Jay White vs. Hangman Page

ER: Last couple matches were pretty exciting, crowd is noticeably cooled off for this one. I usually like White, but he can also benefit from good opponents, and Page isn't very good, so I get the quieted down crowd. They make an effort though, so things liven up a little bit down the stretch. Once they really get the crowd into things, they immediately go into this lonnnnnnnng and drawn out spot where Page repeatedly tries to set up the slingshot lariat, and White keeps wandering unnaturally to the side to break it up, and Page keeps resetting him, and never actually gets to hit. It's like they were working a silent vaudeville comedy act and it could not have come at a worse time in the match. And then they go from Page not succeeding at hitting his indy offense four times in a row, to the other end of the spectrum, with White hitting a DDT on the apron and then a freaking German suplex from the apron to the floor. What the fuck!? Page flips and lands on his feet and then falls backward, so it's not like he got dumped on his head (earlier he did take a nasty snap dragon suplex in the ring), but it's a crazy spot to come out of nowhere. So much Page offense has a really implausible set up, which means he'll fit right in with New Japan main eventers. This match is really overreaching at this point, it's going way too long. White singles matches can drag on too much. I think he's much better in trios. Page sets up an improbable swinging neckbreaker off the top rope, and it's treated like a big move on commentary, but moments later White is hitting Page with a nasty back suplex on the floor, and another in the ring. They trade big moves. JR even shrugs off a "Well they're hitting a lot of big stuff..." after they keep trading moves. That shooting star shoulderblock is such a risk for what the payoff is. It just looks like a less impactful normal sholderblock, with added risk of breaking his own neck. He throws a nice lariat, but adds in that stupid rope flip right before (that he always stumbles a bit on). White throws so many rough suplexes in this match, all with really low launch angles, all looking like they bounce Page off his head. Way too many of them. And after all of those suplexes, his finisher is basically a Roll the Dice. These two tried to do way much. Page looked tougher than anybody else on the show tonight. Everyone else pinned and submitted so much quicker. They did a lot of things you'd think this crowd would like, but the reactions were never really there.

The Young Bucks vs. The Golden Lovers

ER: This was overly long, overinflated, overkilled match that had plenty of great moments. It tried to have way too many great moments, but it had some great moments. It also had moments where I watched in 2x speed. It was around for awhile. This was the match fans in attendance wanted to see, they wanted to celebrate modern New Japan, and this match gave them the chance to chant and clap "Fight Forever" and "New Japan". They are a part of something, this is their punk rock, etc. I thought this was a great Nick Jackson performance, with Matt stepping it up down the stretch. Ibushi is a nut, but I hate that he does so much offense that can occasionally drop himself on his own head. But this whole production was just stretched too long. They could have made much better use of partner saves. There are a lot of kickouts, and by the end Matt Jackson is kicking out of everything. It was a little deflating. They overpeaked it and suddenly they were the last person to finish at an orgy, and everyone's been done for 15 minutes and you're still working towards a finish. The big time where they utilize a partner save to great effect, Matt had just kicked out of some huge things, so Ibushi hits the V Trigger, with Omega hitting the One Winged Angel. OWA is one of the more contrived set-ups in finisher history, but it's super protected and Nick flying in for the save was awesome. But it had all gone on for so long at that point. Ibushi was off a bit all match. He'll still commit to crazy, but some nights he's like Sabu, looking just as ready to injure himself as his opponent. The first table spot was handled really nicely, I always like a good instance of something set up early that is forgotten later, until it makes its presence known again. This usage reminded me of the great Modest/Daniels vs. LeGrande/Thompson match I flipped out live for so many years ago. The table had been set up at ringside long before, and the Bucks were trying to separate Ibushi from Omega, Omega kept getting knocked to the floor, as the Bucks tried to string offense together, and after Nick hits a 450 then Matt goes crashing off the top through Omega, through a table.

I loved the sequence around that, but it is always fleeting with these guys, as it felt big enough to lead to a finish, but instead Omega is back quicker than expected and - and here's what I hate - instead of coming back and just beating ass, Omega is worried about getting Matt up onto his shoulders so Ibushi can fall on his head kicking someone. Having such clunky, difficult to set up finishers just makes guys look stupid when they come roaring back into the match and have to go through a convoluted sequence. We get Omega snap dragon suplexing Matt, only for Matt to bounce off his own neck and spring up to do a piledriver. Both moves looked great, and Matt grabs at his neck (after popping up from a suplex and delivering a piledriver, naturally), but they always leave me a little empty. Matt was good down the stretch and delivered the storyline heft, and Nick was great throughout, his timing more on point than anyone in the match (and matches like this obviously need some precision timing), I loved some of the sequences in the match, but didn't always love where they lead, and I think some of the bigger moves would have felt even bigger if Hangman Page hadn't just brushed off several headdrop suplexes. I want more space in a match like this, but the fans got the exact match they wanted, so I am not shocked that this is getting called classic. I wouldn't go classic, but it was plenty fun.


ER: A not bad show. They announced they were coming to the Cow Palace on 7/7, and I'm not sure what would need to be on the card to get me in the building. The word is Jericho/Naito, and that will not get me in the building. But if they do Liger/Mysterio? That would probably get me. It all depends on the price point, as I have an unknown mental price point in my head for everything ("I will happily see this music band for $10. Oh, the show is $20? I am less interested."), but I'll know it when I see it for this show. It's like art, you know what you like when you see it. For the Cow Palace show, I'll know if it's out of my range or not when I see the price. But on this show, I liked Liger/Ospreay, liked the Sabre/Suzuki tag, really thought the show breezed by nicely until White/Page.

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Lucha Worth Watching: CMLL 8/25/17

Zeuxis/Amapola/La Comandante vs. Princesa Sugehit/La Vaquerita/Sanely (CMLL 8/25/17)

ER: Short but intense ladies match, the first I've written up in awhile. Too often the ladies seem to go through the motions, but occasionally you get some unexpectedly inspired stuff on a Friday at Arena Mexico. Zeuxis and Sugehit go at it the whole match, with Zeuxis tossing Sugehit around the announcers booth and ripping her mask off to get DQ'd. Zeuxis has the best hair in the division and wrestles like it. Only someone with great hair can rip masks with that much evil glee. And it all builds to a great moment in the segunda where the rudas are dominating and Zeuxis runs down the ramp to get a running start at something sure to be wicked, and Sugehit runs out with a new mask to intercept her by the hair. This leads to a big tecnica comeback, with Sugehit ripping at Zeuxis' mask and throwing her around ringside, Amapola doing a huge Cassandro bump around the ringpost, Comandante and her newly relaxed hair gets dropkicked to the floor, Sanely...well, takes her shirt off to a big reaction, and Sugehit gets the roll up win after yanking Zeuxis' mask. Afterwards we get mask match promos which is a match with a lot of potential. I'm in.

Juice Robinson/Michael Elgin/Matt Taven vs. Volador Jr./Diamante Azul/Ultimo Guerrero (CMLL 8/25/17)

ER: Invading foreigner matches always seem to land less than they should, but this one was a blast even though this wouldn't be my first choice for foreigners or invaders. But the invaders worked like such outright dickbags that it totally worked. Juice Robinson especially was a standout, a real impressive athlete who was a favorite of mine on NXT. He was throwing all these stiff left jabs that reminded me just how much Marco has stopped caring about his left hands over the last year+. Juice kept using these annoying hands to set up other's offense, like punching someone directly into a Elgin german. Elgin is an odd fit for lucha, but he nestled in nicely doing his huge power moves (Arena Mexico seemed impressed when he did the samoan drop on Azul while doing a fallaway slam on Volador) and was around for the big moment which was Azul finally hitting his own huge german on him. Elgin even crushes Kemonito with a huge powerslam, poor guy looked like he really got smooshedTaven always looks like a slime, like every girl's least favorite crush in Color Me Badd, and while I don't think he has great offense I like how his flying moves always seem totally unhinged and out of control: Here he hits a no hands torpedo dive over the top and blasts UG hard into the barricade. Later Taven takes a great splat bump to the floor off UG's baseball slide dropkick. As much as I hate Volador epic main event singles matches, I think he's good in these rally the troops matches, and his superkick right under Juice's chin (with Juice timber sell and spit take) was a real highlight of the match. Finish set up is silly, with Johnny Idol coming out to distract UG, really felt like the same dumb 1999 WWE finish we got sick of 18 years ago, only difference was Idol's theme music didn't play. BUT. But. UG turns right around into Taven kicking him in the balls, and it kind of made it all worth it. Fun match, and I am now pissed that it doesn't appear the Juice/Shocker singles match is online.

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NJPW G1 Special in USA - Night 2 Live (as it airs) Blog

So the first of these didn't go too terribly, so I figured WHY NOT. Why not do it again. He never knew when to quit.

1. Jushin Liger/David Finlay/KUSHIDA vs. Yoshitatsu/Yohei Komatsu/Sho Tanaka

Boy Yoshitatsu sure does have an epic entrance song for a guy loathed by everyone in attendance. It's still hard for me to distance Finlay from his father. Any comparisons will be unfavorable. I like how Liger works Komatsu, and it seems to wake up Komatsu more than when up against other guys. Liger hits a nasty baseball slide dropkick and Komatsu flies gloriously into the rail. Tempura Boyz also nicely catch a KUSHIDA flip dive, and I really dig how Tanaka fights KUSHIDA over the hoverboard lock. I'm happy as Tanaka catches a KUSHIDA handspring into a german, just because I get so damn tired of handsprings. They must be punished. Finlay throws a great back elbow...but then he throws another that's not as good...and then does a silly diving European uppercut. I was hoping for more Yoshitatsu gloating, rubbing it into the fans how he knows they hate him, but he doesn't care. This is about as base level as you can get for a trios match. I see that Meltzer gave it ***1/4 which just means that a random CMLL episode must be total ecstasy for him. Nothing will be remembered about this match. ***1/4 seems fairly memorable to me.

2. Kenny Omega vs. Jay Lethal

This starts great as Lethal has his ribs taped up and Omega just kicks him hard a couple times right in the tape, then does a front suplex right onto the apron. Fuck your ribs, Jay. They do some do-si-do stuff, Lethal gets into the OWA in about the least convoluted way I've seen, then Omega somehow plausibly makes the lethal injection look good. Lethal didn't take forever setting it up either, and it actually looked good! Then Lethal warms my heart by nailing Omega with three straight topes into the barrier. I like when guys capitalize on big moves. Omega gets his leg worked over and after a dragon screw Lethal yells "He's a dead man!!" and then proceeds to measure his distance, hit a slow motion handspring, and get caught in a backstabber. I take back me liking the move a few sentences ago, the lethal injection remains the stupidest finisher in wrestling. I cannot think of another instance where you'd go in for the kill by walking momentarily on your hands away from an opponent. I saw Keith Hernandez on a 1986 episode of Dick Cavett, and he was talking about when they started allowing women in the locker rooms. And on the very first day it was allowed, Keith came walking out of the showers naked, on his hands. IF 1986 Keith Hernandez had delivered a totally nude lethal injection (the terrible finisher, not some gross euphemism for penetration) to the first woman allowed in a locker room, that would have been the only acceptable lethal injection ever performed. Lethal gets caught by the transition dragon suplex, because, you know, he points to the ropes opposite his opponent, yells that he's going to slowly bounce upside down off of them, and then gets caught. Lethal matches have become an exercise in getting caught doing stupid things. He has strikes that are good enough to make him maybe the most frustrating wrestler in the states, because he keeps insisting on working his matches entirely around his awful finisher. And speaking of awful finishers, both men then carefully balance while doing a couple reversals based around the one wing angel. If Omega can do a bad handspring into getting his opponent somehow on his shoulders...I think we could reach nirvana.

3. Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Tomohiro Ishii

I love this total style clash match-up, and love Sabre for coming out and trying to slap Ishii. Sabre foolishly playing into Ishii's one strength is great, and then Sabre ups things by headbutting him. Sabre takes some shots and finally kicks Ishii in the bicep and Barnett is talking about his "Lancashire style" and it's pretty great. Sabre eats a big shoulderblock and nice delayed superplex, then kicks Ishii's bicep again, lands a great short uppercut and then hits a killer jumping northern lights. THAT looked freakish, like some mutant Alexander Otsuka move. Ishii finally gets wise and catches one of those kicks aimed at his bicep, but Sabre rolls him through with a bridge. Here's a neat thing about Sabre's bridge: he pins Ishii's shoulders down by standing on his armpits. That's some fine detail work right there. Sabre locks on a great twisty sub and keeps grabbing each Ishii limb that gets close to the ropes, great moment where the crowd kept getting louder every new iteration of the sub, and finally Ishii reached ropes and lay there holding his arms and body. Sabre leaps at Ishii to try to lock on his nasty wristlock, comes close, opts to hit the penalty kick...but modern offense cannot hurt Ishii, and he barrels through him with a lariat and delayed brainbuster. Satisfying match, fun to see Ishii out of his brainless stiff exchange pattern.

4. Juice Robinson/Dragon Lee/Jay White/Titan/Volador Jr. vs. SANADA/Hiromu Takahashi/Tetsuya Naito/BUSHI/EVIL

I look up and think Takahashi's tron video said "Tickling Time Bomb", which would be a decent gimmick. BUSHI is wearing the super cool black/red gear, looking like a final boss ninja. SANADA continues to warm my heart by dropkicking Titan during his handspring. Death to all hand springs! EVIL mostly sucks, but American fans still like him because he has that Japanese credibility. SANADA plays lucha maestro by locking on a couple Nieblinas and JR chooses the first strike of the match to gush over as a sliding kick by Naito that whiffs. Boy, Titan has been in this whole match. There are 4 other guys, buddy. Naito takes Juice's leaping sidekick better than any man has taken it, and then Juice throws a great lefty lariat on SANADA in the corner before hitting a couple cannonballs. Our first strike exchange of the evening actually belongs to Lee and Takahashi, which is like the least interesting thing they can do to their bodies. Having them match up in a 10 man is kind of pointless as we've seen them in multiple long singles matches, there's really only so much they can do during a 90 second exchange. White throws some cool off balance strikes that shouldn't look as good as they do, and SANADA continues burrowing his way deep into my heart by being the only guy doing interesting things on the apron. JR starts talking about Tony Garea while BUSHI takes forever setting up a missed move off the top. Juice hits a weird/cool short left hand to KO Takahashi off the apron and Jay White finishes things by running through a few 1999 Power Plant graduate finisher moves.

5. Tama Tonga/Tanga Loa/Hangman Page vs. War Machine/Michael Elgin

This match and one other I'm weirdly excited for are the ones that Meltzer did not give a ***+ rating to, which makes me more excited for both of them. Has someone less threatening ever been given a cool nickname like "Hangman"? "Christ Stomper" Stephen Hawking. "Throat Slasher" Eddie Deezen.  Yeah this match kinda blows so far, but no more than our first trios. A lot of cracks showing through in this match, guys waiting in position for other guys, delaying moves that are supposed to get interrupted...but then Tonga takes a crazy fast bump over the top to the floor, and Page gets hiptossed into Loa (while Loa is draped over the ropes) and I'm in. The War Machine springboard clothesline german suplex is cool - indy as hell, but cool. But then we do some lame "hit me so I can show you how tough I am" stuff that takes me back out. BUT, Hanson hits a big top rope cannonball and I'm back. Rowe always does a couple cool things in his matches, here I dug him headbutting Tonga's arm as Tonga threw a forearm, and he also bumped a Page lariat bigger than it probably deserved. Match was okay.

6. Roppongi Vice vs. Young Bucks

Pretty early "fuck this match" as they do a bunch of goofy as hell missed somersault legdrops, then everyone throws a dropkick at once and the crowd ERUPTS in applause. Then they all do the worst phone booth fighting you've ever seen. The rest of this is going to have to be incredible to get it to its ****1/4 designation. Romero always has an incredible knack for moving in far enough so that he never catches his opponent on dives to the floor. They always end up flying just over his head, in the same way John Morrison has been overshooting his twisting moonsault for a decade now. Bucks always do things I like, and I'm probably higher on them than most humans (at least ones that run in our niche nerd circles), but they're better than what this match has been. This has been a bad Eliminators "hold still so I can do spots" match, with dodgier execution. "A jumping piledriver on the apron should spell disaster for Nick Jackson." I mean...you would think that, wouldn't you, JR? But even with another piledriver back in the ring, it wasn't enough. There are several more moves that don't finish Nick Jackson. They cut to someone in the crowd marking out, and that someone MAY have been Marty the Moth. He looked like he was having the time of his life. Man, I do not need a "We're having a WAR!!" strike exchange with fucking Rocky Romero. Matt just completely no sells a Romero dive, which makes sense, it looked terrible. But it looked no worse than any Romero tope, and those all get sold. So it's weird for him to just take this one and decide "Wait a minute these are terrible, I didn't get hurt at all!" and pick him up. They do an insane Meltzer driver to the floor (and toss in a nice tribute to Herb Meltzer, which was genuinely nice), then they do another in the ring that doesn't hit at all. This match was terrible. I mean really, really terrible.

7. Cody/Yujiro Takahashi/Bad Luck Fale/Marty Scurll vs. Briscoes/Will Ospreay/Kazuchika Okada

Scurll found a way to make me lose interest during a Mark Briscoe sequence. That's a special kind of boring right there. This has more stalling than an '89 Rougeaus match, but is nowhere near as entertaining. This match and the prior one are finally making this live report seem like a terrible idea. Man this match is bad. Ospreay the only one with a raised heart rate. Everything in this match is taking so long, and guys are selling without taking hardly any moves of any kind. Yujiro gets his head snapped nastily on a Jay neckbreaker, then bites Jay's thumb, hits a couple light sliding dropkicks and thankfully Jay levels him with an elbow. I think guys are trying to work comedy spots? Nothing is very funny, but I think that's what's happening. That's the problem with having offense that looks like shit, is it's never quite clear if you're just having a laugh. This match is just interminably long. Ospreay hits a big flip dive and hits a flipping...knee? elbow? on Cody. Cody sells it by doing his finisher moments later. God this match was fucking awful. Here's hoping Billy Gunn can save this show!

8. Billy Gunn vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi

The crowd boos Gunn because they're shitty. I've never been a Billy Gunn fan, but this kind of match-up seems way more interesting that seeing another wankfest rematch against any number of NJ natives. And Gunn is great doing all this slow annoying stuff that must be infuriating the live crowd. Showing off his height during lock-ups, yanking Tanahashi's ponytail during a headlock takeover, and then going after Tanahashi's taped up arm. Single arm DDT, smacking it into ring posts, and the fans hate it!! Gunn even punches Tanahashi out of the air, but Tanahashi doesn't bump his missed axe handle like Arn. Gunn is awesome punching Tanahashi while holding his ponytail. The man is wearing a ponytail in a wrestling match, it needs to constantly be used against him. Gunn gets his trunks pulled down and awesomely continues working with his trunks down. Only weenies give a shit if their underwear is showing. Tanahashi finally goes on his first run of offense, and exclusively uses the arm we've seen get worked over the past 10 minutes. Flying forearm, hip toss, leaping elbow, I mean literally all the moves he did at first opportunity used his bad arm. Tanahashi only knows how to work New Japan Main Event Epic and it is embarrassingly on display here, though has been hinted at in the way he completely disappears during trios matches. Not a good match, but a match that should have been good, and all it would have taken was a LITTLE bit of effort from Tanahashi. He showed no interest in selling, showed no interest in being engaged while in holds, clearly put half ass into his offense. Terrible Tanahashi performance.

9. Kenny Omega vs. Tomohiro Ishii

I'll be honest, I'm probably not in the best mood for this match. The Tag match was terrible, that 8 man match was embarrassing, and that Tanahashi match was one of the more phoned in performances you've seen this side of an Orton main event. 30 minutes of NJ epic is not going to be what I need. Let's see if they can win me over. But 10 minutes in we've just predictably got a lot of "I'll show YOU how tough I am, hit me!!" junk. The floor brawling was inspired but too brief. Ishii will take a DDT right on top of his head, and he'll do the same with Omega's stupid high jump bulldog. The nastiest part of the match so far is a flip dive from Omega, caught valiantly by Ishii, who also gets his head smashed into the concrete upon catching him. We build to a big stupid table suplex spot, with some amusing stuff like Ishii biting the top rope to prevent Omega from throwing him. Does Ishii have strong teeth strength as one of his known attributes? Because it comes off kind of funny for a guy to try to Jaws his way through things. If you were suplexing Richard Kiel, this would be a familiar spot. Here it felt like an odd joke that was told moments before the joke teller got head-dropped through a table. It's amazing how Kenny Omega is so good at making huge suplex spots mean so little. Top rope dragon suplex against Okada, a dragon suplex off the apron through a table here, they all mean as much as any other move done in his matches. Big deal, I saw a 20/20 piece on backyard wrestling 15 years ago and a kid took a burning hammer on a picnic table in a park. There's a good chance it meant more to whatever match those two idiot teens were having. Finishing stretch sees Ishii dumped on his head by the snapdragon, kneed in the face, and go down with fighting spirit to the end. Good for them. This sure was New Japan-y.


I never know when to quit. This show was fucking awful. I liked the Sabre/Ishii match and the 10 man, couple other matches had their moments...but man there were some dogshit awful performances peppered throughout this show.

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NJPW G1 Special in USA - Night 1 24 Hrs Later Not Live Blog

Even if I'm not very interested in the New Japan product, it's inarguable that it's the hot trend among our niche online wrestling culture. Even though I rarely match up with the popular opinions on New Japan, the appeal kind of fascinates me because I don't totally understand it. A lot of things that I see and think "Wow this looks terrible!", and it's still oddly jarring to see plenty of people see the exact opposite. Still, I think it's cool they're giving the US some shows, and I think it's cool they got broadcast live. We were out all day yesterday, and against my instincts - and without knowing much about the card or the results - I figured I would waste some time on a Sunday checking it out.


1. Bullet Club (Young Bucks/Bad Luck Fale/Marty Scurll/Yujiro Takahashi) vs. CHAOS (Briscoes/Will Ospreay/Roppongi Vice)

30 seconds of Scurll and I'm already kind of regretting this decision. His act feels composed entirely of movements that you've seen before, done better. But the Briscoes make me feel better about this decision. We get a great double team jab/chop combo, Mark hits a nice dive, Jays hits a dynamite baseball slide and then a crazy blockbuster to the floor, and this is getting good. The Bucks collapse a ring barrier on a dive and Ospreay hits the most gorgeous possible springboard SSP. That Scurll finger breaking spot is one of those things you flip for the first time, and at a certain point you realize how completely stupid it is to expect any wrestler to sell broken fingers 2 minutes into a match. Mark Briscoe is looking great though, flying in with a great rana and leaning deep into a Bucks superkick, and this whole thing is really good whenever it's not Scurll in the ring. Fale seems really out of place in this 10 man, doesn't look very plausible taking Romero offense. This whole thing was quicker than it should have been, and they easily could have dropped a few guys and made it into a better 6 or 8 man, but I assume they're trying to get as many guys on the card as possible. Matt Jackson: "I can't lose on TV, I got a deal with Hot Topic!"

2. Hiromu Takahashi//SANADA/EVIL/BUSHI vs. Jushin Liger/Dragon Lee/Titan/Volador Jr.

Weird they would frontload all these multiman matches, seems like they would be better served having them between tournament matches. Liger seems slower than the last time I saw him. I think he's better now in singles, that don't require the go go pace of an 8 man. SANADA takes a high bump to the floor and a sharp back elbow. Lee and Takahashi are guys whose match-up benefits from a multiman, because they don't have to kick out of absurd moves, but instead come in for some lightning in 15 second bursts. Takahashi whips himself into a German faster than anybody, it's nuts. SANADA mans up and catches Titan on a nutso dive, and suddenly this match is making me really want more SANADA. Titan ups the crazy by sprawling spectacularly into the buckles on a bump and eating a chairshot. Another short match, really feels like a major waste of some of the guys involved. I both appreciate them not making this a 6 hour card, while being disappointed in the match lengths so far.

3. Hangman Page vs. Jay Lethal

These flimsy ring barriers have already made a couple of nice spots look spectacular, I think we've had a barrier get knocked over every match so far. Here a nice Lethal dive looks devastating as Page gets plastered right through it. This just in: Page's shooting star shoulder block STILL the most "indy" move in wrestling. I say that, of course, before remembering that the Lethal Injection is somehow considered a finisher. I think I really like Lethal, except for that move's glaring stupidity. But considering matches often build to that move, it's a major problem. His rolling elbow and enziguiri look nice here, he eats a big clothesline, but we keep going back to that stupid slow handspring. When he finally hits it, he totally whiffs on it and Page sells it the same anyway. My god the move is the worst. And we get a 4th attempt and it lands short, but thankfully Page leaps forward right into it. If he literally just used any other boring finisher, his matches would be so much better, as all his in between stuff looked really great: great variety of kicks, elbows that land heavy, nice punches, but when so much of the match is built around something that stupid...

4. Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Juice Robinson

I think every match has featured someone with a strike combo that ends in a standing senton. I shouldn't complain as the senton is one of the most logical moves in wrestling, just dropping your body on a guy's ribs, but it's weird how many of these guys just aim to wrestle so similarly. Heel Sabre is wonderful as he has a great mug for smug showoff shit, and has a nice arsenal of cocky spots. There's mocking stuff like the dreadlocks cravat, but meatier stuff like nasty wrist bends, and subtler stuff like stepping on Juice's hand before applying a hold. People who discredit him as someone who just puts on "holds exhibitions" don't give him credit for cool stuff like that, distracting his opponent with one bit of pain before applying something more dangerous right after. Juice is good at setting up Sabre's nastiest stuff, and the powerbomb out of a triangle was a nice comeback spot. The match ending octopus hold was sick, and I love the set up with Sabre kicking Juice's bad wing, Juice instinctively punching him but doing further damage to the arm in the process, and leaving himself open to be stretched to submission. Really satisfying 10 minute match.

5. Yohei Komatsu/Sho Tanaka/Yoshi Tatsu/Billy Gunn vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi/David Finlay/Jay White/KUSHIDA

Boy this feels like a lopsided match-up. I don't know if Tempura Boyz are actually any good. I really loved a Komatsu/Liger match from a couple years ago, but I think I more loved the structure of vet vs. rookie than his actual ring work. I do love the heat Gunn is getting. He knows he's as out of place on this card as the ticket buyers think he is, so I love him going in there and just soaking it up. His lightly hurt face after his 1999 Suck It draws boos was perfectly done. People dump on Tatsu but he's got the Toecutter hair, gets dumped on his dome by Jay White, hits a fast low angle spinkick, and has no problem getting suplexed into the buckles. Finlay works like 2005 Roderick Strong mixed with current Barbaro Cavernario. His dad needs to teach him how to stomp hands and headbutt chests. Tanahashi's slingblade looked like crap against Gunn, and I don't think it was Gunn's fault. Overall, this wasn't much.

6. War Machine vs. Guerrillas of Destiny

I don't think I actually knew Camacho was Meng's kid when he was in WWE. They make this No DQ, but that just means they use some flimsy trash can lid shots, when their normal match strikes look better. I'd rather see them headbutting War Machine in the nose than hitting them in their meaty backs with a lid. I hate how "agile" Hanson tries to wrestle. Rowe embraces the hoss and is better for it. Hanson has too many spots that get too cute. But him getting powerslammed off a springboard is an impressively nutty spot to take. Tanga hits a nasty diving headbutt, and diving headbutts are still a thing guys are doing in 2017. Rowe eats a powerbomb through chairs, and probably lucky for him he parts them instead of bending through them with his kidneys. Hanson uses his cartwheel smarter than normal, organically using it to dodge a charge. It usually feels so much more planned out. And his dive is always impressive. But, I will say, the few times Stan Hansen did it in All Japan are so much more memorable because of how seldom he did it. The powerbomb/legdrop through the table was impeccably timed.

7. Tetsuya Naito vs. Tomohiro Ishii

This is fine but I'm kind of numb to Ishii's masochistic style at this point. Naito doesn't work as stiff a style as other guys who he's just endlessly stood and exchanged with, so it rings a little hollow to see him selling thigh slaps more than he sells say Shibata elbowing him in the throat. Naito makes amusing faces while eating gross chops, and I like a few of the cockier touches that he brings, like wiping his boots on the back of Ishii's head. His spit spot is always stupid and gross, but we ramp up to a whole new level when he spits blood in Ishii's face, and it actually makes me cheer when Ishii clobbers him with a vicious headbutt and snaps him with a folding powerbomb. I can't actually tell if Naito just botched running up the ropes a couple times in trying to the tornado DDT, but if they did then they expertly covered it and made it seem like Ishii was just pulling him away from the ropes to block. Either way, it made the DDT mean a lot more. They lost me a little bit with each guy showing how they can get dropped on different parts of their dome, but the 15 minute run time was far more satisfying than if this same match was in the Dome. I imagine it would go 25 and the pinfall here would just be the beginning. This was fine but felt a bit too much like they ramped up to "we're having an epic".

8. Michael Elgin vs. Kenny Omega

Elgin has a great shoulderblock and back elbow, and Omega has no problem leaning into a huge shoulderblock. Taking offense is obviously not Omega's problem. Love powerslam spots and Elgin always has a nice one. I would love it if he did more, really. JR talks about how they're starting "slow" but we've already gotten a powerslam, a shoulderblock dive off the top, and a brainbuster. Omega nails the leg lariat on the concrete and he actually hits it, usually he just leaps all the way over his opponent and they take a faceplant. Omega always has really weak looking chinlocks, and his backpack sleeper was even worse. His arm didn't even look like it was touching Elgin's neck. It was barely touching his beard. Elgin always has a lot of great looking slams, but it's the same problem as Angle letting everybody reverse his ankle lock, it just makes his own moves look weak. They all look spine crushing, but they're all treated like early match bodyslams. Like, holy shit, here's this German suplex on the freaking apron, followed by a freaking crucifix power bomb off the middle buckle, and Omega kicks out of it the EXACT same way he kicked out of the brainbuster 4 minutes into the match. The previous match ENDED with a brainbuster, and here it was nothing. But we now know that apron German and crucifix bomb are not much either. Elgin lays Omega out with the burliest clothesline on this show by far, but Omega still kicks out all the same. Seriously, he only knows how to kick out one specific way, always at the exact same time, every count. Every move *almost* puts me away, but no moves actually finish me! After Omega gets the back of his head blasted into the mat a few times, that unlocks the "do all your offense in a row" part of his brain, so we get a bunch of running knees (some looked great, some looked like femur bruising slaps). I admire Omega's restraint to not drop Elgin vertically on the clutch tombstone, and he eventually does all the right dance steps in the right order to unlock his finisher.

9. Cody vs. Kazuchika Okada

I will never not love when a heel postpones the opening bell so that he can go and kiss his attractive spouse. And Cody's shiny America tights and stars n stripe boots are glorious. HOWEVER, not using red/white/blue kinesio tape is that little touch to detail that shows that Cody JUST DON'T FUCKING GET IT. He gets it...but doesn't totally GET it. But then Brandi is wearing a fucking sequined American flag cocktail dress and he obviously fucking gets it. That dress would boost the ticket sales to any fucking USO show out there. I could be completely crazy, but has anybody else noticed the AXS cameras specifically focusing on couples in the crowd? 80% of the up close camera shots are of two slender, charming couples, chanting for their favorites and occasionally smiling at each other. Were they given a directive of "hey, no fattie neckbeards, okay? We gotta make this look like it's worth 4 hours of schedule." Okada having to find a way to get his opponent on the buckles so he can dropkick them off, yet always doing it the same way, is just as stupid as "you can't powerbomb Kidman" or somebody trying to sunset flip Super Porky or Rikishi. It needs to be said. Okada is a prettier face, conditioned haired, Billy Kidman except without all the deathwish bumps. Okay, they just showed a couple guys in the crowd who didn't APPEAR to be a couple, but one of the guys looked kinda like between-shoot-body Dan Stevens, so they may have thought they were showing a celebrity. Okada calls for the Rainmaker which just shows he's never heard of Albert Hammond Sr. before. Cody is the only guy in New Japan who understands how to use slaps. You mockingly smack a guy to muss his hair, or you do one after wide-eyed shit talking, or you use them to allow your opponent to get angry enough to justify their transition to offense. Cody gets - and uses - all three of them. You just don't stand and trade them. Cody understands the best way to use the Rainmaker is to make scared fans think that Cody was somehow going to get the title. When I wanted Brian Kendrick to desperately win the CWC and he got that one great nearfall on Ibushi? That joy I felt is tantamount to the fear these fans felt when they thought Okada would lose. Okada, however, does not lose.


You know, this could have been an absolute disaster of an idea. But this was a nice high floor low ceiling show. No blowaway great matches, but nothing that made me want to lean on the FF. A lot of the best stuff were the matches that hit the proper time, that money 10-15 minute zone. So it was nice to see this NJ style that I dislike, worked slightly toned down (I say toned down only because only one guy dumped himself on his head 3+ times, and nobody lost feeling in the right side of their body from a shoot strike on a nearfall). I liked tons of individual performances on the show, thought Cody looked great in the main, thought Sabre and Juice complemented each other well, SANADA looked like a guy I would actually request recommended matches from (any SANADA matches that would make our MOTY List from the last few years?), so it was a breezy view. I drank good coffee, played with my cat son Tacos, goofed off on Twitter, and watched some decent wrestling. It's a quality Sunday.

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