New Japan Pro Wrestling on AXS TV 7/31/15 Review

1. Bad Luck Fale vs. Shinsuke Nakamura (8/8/14)

I liked Nakamura in this, though the match was kinda junk. We had lazy move set ups like Fale going up top for the sole purpose of setting up a Nak superplex. But Nakamura took Fale's Grenade nicely, and dished out a bunch of big knees, scrambling knees to the ribs, wild running knees to the face, big kicks to cut down Fale. But the laziness in the transitions pretty much killed this one for me.

2. AJ Styles vs. Togi Makabe (8/8/14)

Fun match (though the version shown on TV was clipped down to nothing), which I wasn't really expecting as Makabe doesn't do much for me. Styles really uses that Styles Clash top rope set up a lot, where he Pele kicks his opponent up top then lifts him down into the Clash. I don't really know that I would have noticed it if they hadn't been showing weekly Styles matches. But I liked a lot of his other stuff here and the G1 was quite a nice little tear for him. Really liked his forearm into the crowd.

3. Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi (8/8/14)

Mauro says that DBS is as agile as a cruiserweight but man this guy always seems like a really uncoordinated lummox to me. I genuinely can't think of any moments of him moving around like a lithe little cruiser. He just looks like a slightly more in shape version of Alison Hendrix's husband on Orphan Black. In showing a lot of G1 matches, they did a strange thing, in that they showed every major upset during the whole tournament. But since there is only so much TV time, 1-2 matches a week were "monumental upsets", so you constantly had Mauro screaming about how this is one of the biggest upsets he's ever seen and the biggest win of so and so's career, and it just starts to lose something week after week and becomes more of a "Greatest Night in the History of our Sport" kind of thing. Tanahashi didn't look very good in this one, his stuff was reallll loose, and you know that's saying something if Tanahashi's stuff looks notably looser than normal. Smith has some nice power offense, a good powerslam and great capture suplex, but he's a guy I'm entirely uninterested in so this win didn't matter a whole lot to me.

4. Minoru Suzuki vs. Kazuchika Okada (8/8/14)

Okada's pre-match promos are one of the better utilized things about this program, as he regularly does some high end kayfabe sit downs about why his opponent is going to be tough, why the match is important, and does so much better than Mauro has ever been able to get across during his actual matches. Here he says that Suzuki is a difficult opponent because he always ends up being tricked into playing Suzuki's game, tricked into working at Suzuki's pace instead of his own pace. I liked that little touch a lot and is really something an announcer should pick up on (especially recording these things long after they happen). This was a good match although some segments could have been reordered to more success. At one point Okada hit a big clutch piledriver after working over Suzuki's neck, but due to the structure Suzuki had to basically get up right after taking it because the match called for him reversing Okada's next run of offense. Poor placement. Suzuki's neck selling was really great (except for the unfortunate piledriver placement), throwing in nice details he doesn't always bother with, sometimes with a neat twist on his own style. At one point he gets tossed into the ropes, and Suzuki is a guy who always no sells rope running, usually by just holding onto the ropes. Here he crumbles before reaching the ropes, holding onto the back of his neck and just falling into the ropes. At times he was really vicious with Okada. His knees right to Okada's jaw after a blocked Gotch piledriver was tooth rattling, and his running dropkick put every Okada dropkick I've ever seen to absolute shame. And damn did he put over the Rainmaker huge, landing in an impossibly painful position right on his head; but his neck didn't really bend so it looked like a grotesque drawing they used to have on the side of diving boards, with a cartoon diving into an empty pool. So yeah, some problematic placement of some big spots, but all in all a good performance by both.

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New Japan Pro Wrestling on AXS TV Episode 16 Review

1. Lance Archer & Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. TenKoji (6/21/14)

I remember a time a decade ago when Lance Archer was a total embarrassment, truly one of the worst wrestlers in the world to appear on my television. I'm in my mid 30s now, I'm a homeowner, and Lance Archer is still a total embarrassment, truly one of the worst wrestlers in the world currently appearing on my television. Man there is not one thing he does well in the ring. He takes offense like he's scared to be hit, always preparing more for the bump he's about to take. His offense is just terrible. We - me the author and you the reader - we know what moves he's supposed to be doing just because we know the movements. But I have no clue what a first time viewer would think Archer was doing half the time. At one point he did a standing splash and Rachel actually had no clue what he was attempting. It's like he was making a weird human tent over him. He just sort of jumped up and landed on all fours, but no part of him came close to touching Kojima. Even worse he awkwardly yelled "Let's get CRAZY!!!" before hitting it. You have never seen anything less crazy that Lance Archer's standing splash. Out of all the things to possibly yell to the crowd...DBS Jr. isn't good either, but it's easy to not notice that when Archer is bumbling all over the ring. For every tiny thing DBS does well, he does something real poor. Nice knees to the stomach, horrible kicks to the stomach. He tries to carry himself like a big guy, but works real soft. Tenzan looked good in this, hit a nice spinkick, tried his damndest to make The Killer Elite Squad (ughhhh that name) look like they have painful offense. Kojima looked kinda sluggish, but DBS didn't do him any favors leaning far away from his lariat. This match was...not good.

2. Hiroshi Tanahashi & Togi Makabe vs. Doc Gallows & Karl Anderson (6/21/14)

Good match, with the story being Makabe was working it with a broken jaw, which sounds like lunacy, but I'll bite. So every shot thrown to Makabe's chin throughout gets a nice sneery reaction from the crowd. Anderson/Gallows work so much better as a team than Archer/Smith, it's really stunning how much work those two get. Gallows/Anderson have their double teams down, and the moves themselves look so much better. Here Gallows hits a great standing splash, and you actually know 100% exactly what it is he's doing. Tanahashi was good in this, fighting for two men essentially. There was an awesome moment where he hit the Sling Blade on Anderson, went up for the HFF and Anderson got the knees up, and right when Tanahashi hit knees Anderson cradled him right up. Awesome near fall, and the spot looked perfect. Makabe isn't great, but this match is kind of an ideal scenario for a Makabe match, as due to his injury he mostly sells, except when he comes back with a big lariat. So limit Makabe to selling and lariats, and things ain't bad! Finish is real nice as Bullet Club dispose of Tanahashi, and Makabe uses the last of his strength to go on a comeback tear, only to get nailed with a jumping Gun Stun, planting him right on his injured jaw. Good stuff.

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New Japan Pro Wrestling on AXS TV Episode 5 Workrate Report

1. Hiroshi Tanahashi, Jushin Liger, Togi Makabe & Captain New Japan vs. Karl Anderson, El Terrible, Tama Tonga & Bad Luck Fale (7/20/13)

Here we get 6 minutes of a 12 minute match, which is better than last week seeing 2 bad minutes of a 15 minute match (although I understand what they were doing by showing Devitt getting a big win over Tanahashi to set up this week's match against Okada). Bullet Club do better in these kind of multi man matches as Anderson and Fale aren't really guys you need to see in singles matches but do enough nice things in 8 mans that it works. Fale can throw out a big corner splash, Anderson can stooge for some Makabe clotheslines, it works. Tonga is probably the best of these guys and I imagine he has a WWE deal waiting for him if he ever wants it. All of his stuff has big impact and a nice snap, and it's funny he's in here with Terrible as he's basically works like a Tongan Terrible. I've never seen "Captain New Japan" before and boy is that goofy. He threw a nice uppercut, but man those velvet-y pajamas. I'm kinda surprised that I've enjoyed Tanahashi as much as I have during this TV run. Some of his little things look like junk, but he has gotten a lot sharper on his crossbodies, throws real nice back elbows, and especially looks good when compared overall against Okada. There was a fun run in here where everybody took turns chopping Fale down, with Tanahashi hitting him, Liger rocking him into the ropes with a palm strike, and then Makabe blasting him to the floor with a clothesline. This match was fine.

2. Prince Devitt vs. Kazuchika Okada (7/20/13)

Man Okada stinks. Every Okada main event they've shown has been worse than the last. The guy hits his shit, usually in the same order, at points in the match where it really doesn't make sense, most of the time it doesn't look that great, and none of the preceding offense from his opponent matters. Devitt didn't look great throughout a lot of this either, but he looked aces next to Okada. At least some of Devitt's offense looked nice, like his double stomps (his double stomp off the top through a chair laid on top of Okada was the nastiest thing in the match, but it didn't matter as Okada was up doing mirror reversal segments moments later). Because it was the Bullet Club we had tons of interference, and for the most part these guys all have really bad timing on their interference. I did like Devitt's stomp to Okada's groin while Anderson was holding him prone on the apron, and Anderson's powerbomb to the apron is a great looking spot, but a little too devastating looking for a guy to take so early into the match. Especially a guy like Okada who will render the spot meaningless within a minute. Barnett and Mauro are in the middle of putting over legendary ref Red Shoes Unno, right as he was completely oblivious to interference that was happening right in front of him. He had another awful performance, both in kayfabe ref terms, and just obnoxious camera hog terms. He has a horrible habit of selling for the wrestlers: Somebody will take a slam type move and he'll jump up holding his own back in pain. At one point both men were down for the count and he did this exaggerated shrug while looking all around at the crowd, making all these awful Sabado Gigante comedy faces like he had freckles and a comically large lollipop. At another point he repeatedly interjects himself in the middle of a forearm exchange yelling and getting in the way and getting completely ignored by the workers. This guy blows. Man this match stunk.

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New Japan Pro Wrestling on AXS TV Episode 4 Workrate Report

1. Prince Devitt vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi (6/22/13)

This is a 15 minute match clipped down to 2 minutes of highlights, so that seems pretty pointless. I liked some of Tanahashi's stuff in this, like his somersault senton and he actually snapped off the Slingblade. Devitt's stuff was all mostly complicated and looked good because Tanahashi flew into it. He's selling a knee intermittently throughout, yet still goes for a huge double stomp off the top. He misses and starts grabbing his knee, but I guess I'm failing to see how it wouldn't still hurt real bad if he had landed flush. Even in these brief highlights we got a fair amount of Bullet Club interference, and at one point Fale/Devitt wait around in hilariously bad fashion for a Tanahashi HFF off the top to the floor.  Devitt gets bumped to the floor and then he and Fale immediately get into position to take the crossbody, even before Tanahashi had even made a motion to do the move. So there they are waiting to take a move that at his quickest would have likely taken Tanahashi 5+ seconds to get into position to perform. Horrible ref Red Shoes Unno also is distracted for a preposterous amount of time by Anderson, just a poorly conceived spot to end a match. So, we get two minutes shown, and there are a couple of horrible moments in those two minutes. Oof.

2. Togi Makabe vs. Kazuchika Okada (6/22/13)

I really liked Makabe in this one, really did not like Okada in this one. Makabe threw a bunch of really great clotheslines and a couple real nice bridging suplexes, but none of it mattered as Okada would just do offense whenever he pleased, sometimes just beating Makabe to his feet after being the one who just took a big move. There were a couple different moments where Okada would get dumped by a suplex, then with both men selling on the mat Okada would be the first one up and just do a move of his own. And a lot of Okada's stuff did not look good. He has a real bad top rope elbow, and the match ended with the Rainmaker, which in this match just means that it ended with a clothesline that looked weaker than all of Makabe's clotheslines. Mauro went full scream mode pretty early in this match, too, although the crowd did get real hot at one point off a Makabe German suplex near fall. But man I'm not getting very excited for more big Okada main events. Dude will just get all his shit in, no matter if it makes sense the way the match is building or not. Still, I liked Makabe a lot more than I remembered, so this wasn't a total waste.

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