SANADA vs. Toru Yano
What an absolutely awesome comedy match. Everything w/ the Paradise Lock & Rocky was legitimately hilarious, and the overall contrast between the characters of SANADA & Toru Yano was so cool, they played off of each other perfectly. ***3/4
Hirooki Goto vs. Tama Tonga
Absolutely nothing interesting about this one. *
Juice Robinson vs. Zack Sabre Jr.
Without a doubt one of the best looking match ups in the entire tournament - I mean, it's Juice Robinson, coming in with a banged up hand going against Zack Sabre Jr. There was no way it wasn't gonna rule; Zack delivered, as usual, in the top-side of things, indeed specifically targeting that hand & arm of Juice's, and Juice was on point w/ his selling & firey comebacks. Very much looking forward to the US Title re-match that was heavily set up w/ this match. ***3/4
Kenny Omega vs. Tomohiro Ishii
There's some generic New Japan big match stuff in the middle, but overall the match had such a great dynamic & Ishii's underdog performance was so amazing that it can't be denied. Omega being a cocky prick to start things off was wonderful, and Ishii's response to that was absolutely priceless with him just playing with Omega's hair to show that he can play those games too. The damn crazy Cruficix counter too, what a great moment. This match also showed the improvement of Kevin Kelly to the maximum; dude went from being one of my least favorite commentators to quite possibly my favorite one - what a phenomenal call in "I'm telling you he's unbeatable, Omega is UNBEATABLE!". What a damned match! ****1/4
Kota Ibushi vs. Tetsuya Naito
What an absolutely awesome comedy match. Everything w/ the Paradise Lock & Rocky was legitimately hilarious, and the overall contrast between the characters of SANADA & Toru Yano was so cool, they played off of each other perfectly. ***3/4
Hirooki Goto vs. Tama Tonga
Absolutely nothing interesting about this one. *
Juice Robinson vs. Zack Sabre Jr.
Without a doubt one of the best looking match ups in the entire tournament - I mean, it's Juice Robinson, coming in with a banged up hand going against Zack Sabre Jr. There was no way it wasn't gonna rule; Zack delivered, as usual, in the top-side of things, indeed specifically targeting that hand & arm of Juice's, and Juice was on point w/ his selling & firey comebacks. Very much looking forward to the US Title re-match that was heavily set up w/ this match. ***3/4
Kenny Omega vs. Tomohiro Ishii
There's some generic New Japan big match stuff in the middle, but overall the match had such a great dynamic & Ishii's underdog performance was so amazing that it can't be denied. Omega being a cocky prick to start things off was wonderful, and Ishii's response to that was absolutely priceless with him just playing with Omega's hair to show that he can play those games too. The damn crazy Cruficix counter too, what a great moment. This match also showed the improvement of Kevin Kelly to the maximum; dude went from being one of my least favorite commentators to quite possibly my favorite one - what a phenomenal call in "I'm telling you he's unbeatable, Omega is UNBEATABLE!". What a damned match! ****1/4
Kota Ibushi vs. Tetsuya Naito
Great match. Thought that Naito was incredibly compelling with his work on top - he didn't do anything overly heely, but his arrogant facial expressions & overall body language were off the charts good. Very vicious with his work over Ibushi's neck & leg; unsurprisingly, Ibushi didn't sell the leg work at all, but if we ignore that, his overall selling was very good. The no selling of the leg work did annoy me a bit though. Thankfully & unsurprisingly his sudden pop-up comebacks were pretty damn great, and the finishing stretch was of course NUTS. ****
No comments:
Post a Comment