Low-Ki Shock a Crowd Like a Bottle of Insulin

Low-Ki vs. King Mo MLW 2/1/20 - FUN

PAS: I appreciated what they tried to do here, although it was mostly ruined by an awful finish. I have been a King Mo fan since the Real Pro Wrestling days, but he isn't very good at non real Pro-Wrestling. This was basically worked like the first Ogawa vs. Hashimoto match. Lawal just destroys Ki for most of the match, he opens with a double leg and chucks him over the top rope, jacking Ki's thigh up. He taunts and mocks Ki while kicking his ass, and I really liked him checking his pulse. Lawal hasn't really figured out how to make pulled shots look good, and probably should have just stiffed Ki. We get a pretty good Ki comeback as he nails an overconfident Mo with a nasty Kappo Kick and locks on a hanging choke. There is a pretty terrible run in finish with Dom and Stevens coming out and shoving the Von Erich's, and the ref just leaving the ring to yell at them while Dan Lambert hits Ki with an umbrella to give Mo the win. Totally takes you out of the cool atmosphere with the hackiest and poorly executed rasslin finish. If you are going to do Hash vs. Ogawa, fucking do it and have Ki destroyed, or have Ki make the big comeback, doing this finish just shits all over the match.

ER: Yeah this felt like it was building to something potentially special but really fell apart down the home stretch. King Mo has presence and confidence and that would be enough to sustain him as a worker, even if his pulled shots don't look great. He hit one leg kick that made some sound, but all of his arm strikes looked really bad, and they couldn't really even be covered up in a "he's just mocking Ki" way because it looked like he was supposed to be wailing on him. It's funny, the past two Ki matches I've watched (this, and his match vs. Masada from a few months ago) have seen Low Ki get annihilated for much of the match. It's such an odd thing to see, as he's always been someone who's been very aggressive on offense regardless of opponent, and now I'm wondering if he's shifting into a different stylistic phase of his career. I really liked where this match was headed, as King Mo hoisted Ki up with a double leg and ran him across the ring, dumping him unceremoniously to the floor. Ki is someone great at selling a hamstring injury, and I loved Mo mocking him for being in over his head. Mo dumped him easily through the ropes with another double leg, and with Ki still selling that injury I was getting into either a Mo destruction or a big limping Ki comeback. Ki was all off balance without his leg, throwing desperate hands that were interesting because they were so out of character for him, and I wasn't sure what he was going to be able to land. But his kappo kick was thrown so perfectly, sending Mo flying and reminding me of all of Ki's available tricks. Still this finish was a real clunker, the kind of bad wrestling finish that is only made possible by making the ref look like an idiot. We get Lawlor running in to knock Low Ki out with an umbrella, and it's really silly to have Low Ki get knocked out by an umbrella than by a man who has knocked out many large humans, all the while the ref is still futzing around in the aisle dealing with Mo's crew. I had pretty high hopes for this one, and liked the early exchanges, but things got iffy once Mo started throwing strikes and others got involved. Shame.


COMPLETE AND ACCURATE LOW KI