Puroresu Love & Resources V3

[cobainwasmurdered]

Putting the belt on him because he's a big name internationally is such a stupid idea it really gives me no faith in NOAH (or by proxy DDT). You don't need to make Mutoh champion to get attention. Also the international audience is nowhere near as important as having an actual fanbase in your own country to rely on. International fans move on to new shit contstantly.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

I mean western IWC discourse went from “New Japan is back!” to “Ugh! New Japan is doomed.” in literally about three months so yeah. Idk if they are the best audience to cater to for a product that generally skews towards long term, intricate storytelling (which is another reason why Mutoh being a World Champion stinks)

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

Btw has anybody gotten any indication of what the domestic Japanese audience thinks of this Mutoh run? Somehow I get the impression that they are less harsh on it than the Western fans.

 

[cobainwasmurdered]

I have no idea but I would bet they are bigger on it yeah. @tekcop is my only real translator and he's been slacking off .

 

[Slayer]

I mean western IWC discourse went from “New Japan is back!” to “Ugh! New Japan is doomed.” in literally about three months

New Japan screwed New Japan

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

I have no idea but I would bet they are bigger on it yeah. @tekcop is my only real translator and he's been slacking off .

One of those dumb assumptions as a "smart" fan that I'm now learning was wrong was that Japanese fans are super critical and workrate minded like the IWC. I think they have a much broader concept of what is good than I thought.

 

[Big Papa Paegan]

That entire belief was shattered for me when I found out that NJPW shows in the 90s with Inoki pulling his shit still did better business than AJPW shows around the Four Pillars. It took that phenomenally bad late 90s/early 00s run of NJPW and the NOAH formation to change the landscape.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1389187784481591302

Got mixed feeling about my main man Switchblade winning. One, I feel like it's a good kayfabe argument that he's better than Kenny Omega.

On the other/slightly negative side, I GET why they're just making NEVER Openweight Title just a straight up #2 title but it's sad to see them losing sight of its HOSS title origins. I feel like it could still be a hoss belt and the #2 belt but Idk. My gut feeling even as a straight up secondary title, this is still probably a bit beneath Jay White and maybe he'll drop it to Ishii to set things right again.

 

[Broward83]

Wasn't the Openweight built as sort of an X Division / Young Lion type belt before guys like Ishii got a hold of it?

 

[Slayer]

Most obvious expectation [for the Champion Carnival] is that this is Jake Lee's year to finally break thru, winning the CC and getting his big TC win over Suwama

Well the first part of that came true as Lee won the CC in what was a pretty intense de facto finals match that was very sorely missing a crowd (fanless matches hit a personal ceiling for me where no matter how good they are substantially, I just can't consider them for MOTY), especially given their history and this being their first 1-on-1 match since Lee's heel turn. As noted, Lee's reward for the win is a TC title shot against Suwama at All Japan's "Champions Night" on May 16.

Also slated for that night is a Junior title rematch between CIMA and the man he beat for the belt, Koji Iwamoto. Speaking of CIMA, of note from the CC final night was him bringing in his boys T-Hawk and Lindaman, the first time I've seen them in a major fed for several months (review of Cagematch shows they've spent the year freelance bouncing around smaller feds plus one minor DDT show I didn't watch). T-Hawk seems to have leaned up since I last saw him, meanwhile Lindaman has grown out his bleach-blond hair to a slicked-back look plus added some sideburns, which combined with his dark tan makes him look like a little Japanese Superstar Billy Graham

 

[Big Beard Booty Daddy]

Wasn't the Openweight built as sort of an X Division / Young Lion type belt before guys like Ishii got a hold of it?

That might have been the original idea, but having Masato Tanaka takes away from that idea. The idea was they would have certain event called NEVER Events, "New Blood", "Evolution", "Valiantly", "Eternal", and "Radical", but that changed pretty much from the start of the tournament to crown the first champion.

 

[Slayer]

To add onto @Big Beard Booty Daddy above, New Japan did hold a few events under the banner of NEVER in 2010-11 where they really were trying to promote it as a separate fed/brand under its original premise as a developmental fed for young up-and-comers, but as he said by the time they decided to establish the title in late 2012 that had pretty well gone out the window

Even beyond Tanaka being the first champ, looking at the inaugural title tournament all the younger guys that would have fit under that original NEVER banner got bounced early and the final four were all well-established veterans

 

[cobainwasmurdered]

That entire belief was shattered for me when I found out that NJPW shows in the 90s with Inoki pulling his shit still did better business than AJPW shows around the Four Pillars. It took that phenomenally bad late 90s/early 00s run of NJPW and the NOAH formation to change the landscape.

no one should ever assume that fans in other countries are any smarter or different that fans here honestly. Wrestling fans are wrestling fans. We might differ in the details but at the end of the day we're the same folk.

 

[Slayer]

Thanks to minor sleep issues I woke up this morning in time to catch the live airing of the Dream Gate and main event cage match from DOA.

The OTDG match unfortunately was marred by an apparent shoulder separation for poor Kikuta, only a minute into the match courtesy of a standard drop toehold, after which he rolled to the outside and hid in one of the alcoves by the ring as Eita came over to help. At first it seemed like the standard heel injury feint (HoHo even remarked as much on commentary), but after awhile it was clear something was legit wrong. He took the full 19 second near-countout before getting back in, after which Shun applied a basic armbar and Eita threw in the towel, ending the match at barely five minutes. Akin to the recent Uriah/Weidman UFC fight (albeit much less gruesome), Shun very clearly did not want to win in this manner and immediately took off to the back with the belt+new key with no celebration in the ring. Not helping is this adding another black eye to Shun's reign together with the Ben-K concussion, which combined will likely overshadow his actual good defenses against Ishida and Kazma.

As for the main event cage match:

Spoiler

Dunno how much of this might have been because of my being half-asleep during my watch, but while it was fun just like most any of the DOA cage matches, I didn't feel like it was ever that intense given the lengthy feuds between the respective pairs. Yamato also bailed what felt fairly early in the match (called out by DK later), eventually resulting SBK and DK facing off in the apuesta match. As expected, that match was marked with large amounts of RED interference with little response by the faces (a huge complaint of mine w/r/t heel factions in DG over the years), but DK overcomes the odds to submit SBK, who eventually takes the "I'll do it myself and not give you the satisfaction" option with the hair clippers

Main positive is that SBKento continues to impress with his character and his work for being only twenty-fucking-one and less than two years into his career

Went back to bed after and have stuff to do this morning so won't be able to watch the remainder until later today.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

You know...I have honestly seen more people defend this current Mutoh GHC Title run than I have the current NJPW product. Which I guess leads credence to the theory that it's better to induce hatred than apathy.

 

[Slayer]

You know...I have honestly seen more people defend this current Mutoh GHC Title run than I have the current NJPW product. Which I guess leads credence to the theory that it's better to induce hatred than apathy.

I'm not really one for the reactions, but in this case I wouldn't know whether to go with the cry-laugh or the SAD response

Maybe SAD cry-laughing into his arm...

 

[Big Beard Booty Daddy]

Wrestling Dontaku happened over the past couple of days. Both were solid with fantastic main events. Both worth watching.

 

[Slayer]

I did watch the Ospreay-Shingo match, the only match I decided to check out from the last two nights, and did enjoy it. The pair seem to be the Tanahashi-Okada of this era where they just cannot have a bad match together and also each match builds upon what's happened in prior ones. One major difference though in this case is the younger Ospreay getting the better of Shingo three times now (two tourney finals and one title defense) while Shingo's lone win came from the G1. I can also forgive the match length given the world title and also them making up for the cancelled Jr title match (poor Yoh and Despy btw...)

On the subject of match length though, looking at Cagematch for the rest of the two nights:

1) Holy crap did they really give 27 minutes to the Iron Fingers ladder match?! Sweet lord, Gedo really needs to be reined in at this point...

2) To a lesser extent in that regard, while I can believe White and Tanahashi had a great match, I'm not liking at all the NEVER title match at nearly 40 minutes. The belt was built on shorter more intense matches in the 15-25 minute range, and a cursory look thru the title match history shows the title bouts rarely if never went past 30 minutes until this Tanahashi reign where his win and loss were 35 and 40 mins resp (at least the OKhan match was only 19). I think if anything the NEVER title matches should be set to a half-hour time limit instead of a full hour to keep it unique and in line with its own history, and sure as hell don't want to see it become IC belt 2.0

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

Like I said I GET why they're making NEVER Title seem more like a generic #2 title but it doesn't have to be that way. They can increase the importance of the title without changing what made it great in the first place.

I'll definitely watch Shingo-Ospreay at some point but even Jay-Tana doesn't pique my interest much and those are two of my favorites.

 

[Slayer]

Wrapped up the rest of DOA

Normally I wouldn't care much about the non-title multimen, but DOA had two fun exceptions with the opener (Big Ben reunion) and the eight man with one side being the mixed team of faces DoiYoshi and heels Eita/Hulk, as Yoshino wanted to experience being a "heel" one last time before retiring (having been face most of his career).

MOTN honor easily goes to the Okuda/UT Brave Gate match

Spoiler

I'm a big Okuda fan and he's become one of my favs in DG, but six months in now he's had four defenses which, while entertaining, have also felt like forgone conclusions with him retaining. This match OTOH was finally the first time I've felt his reign was really threatened (cleanly, not counting RED's interference in the Hyo match) as UT made a believer out of me, not taking any of Okuda's shit from the get go and working him over thru the match. Alas, Okuda managed to eek out a win once he managed to lock in his rear naked choke. As to be expected with their styles this was much more mat wrestling and chain submission based than the typical DG match, but an enjoyable ~10 minutes.

Runner-up goes to the Triangle Gate match, which is generally a safe bet for a good match.

Rounding out the title matches was an okay Twin Gate match

Spoiler

Surprisingly light on outside interference from RED (though weapons did play a big part in the end), but I had been digging this Mochi/Yoshida run and was disappointed they lost already in only their second defense.

I hope those people who'd talked about getting into DG (hence all my spoiler tags) check out this event and offer their thoughts

 

[cobainwasmurdered]

really sucks that Shun's title reign has been so blighted by problems as I'm a big fan of his and I've thought he's had a ton of potential since very early in his career. DG needs to do something to help these guys develop promo skills though beyond just throwing them out to the wolves. Say what you will about WWE they do a lot of promo classes and things to help teach guys. That's something DG should do at the dojo.

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

Bad news...Japanese government has extended the state of emergency until May 31st and added Fukuoka and Aichi to list of cities with the order. However, shows can still run with 5,000 or less (50% capacity in venues where half house dds up to 5,000 or less). So I guess WrestleGrandSlam will still happen.

I wonder if that's why the build for those stadium shows have farted out since they know they'll be running mostly empty domes?

Good news...Onita is starting another FMW revival and their first show is on July 4th (how fitting) I know that holiday doesn't have the same resonance in Japan. I'm not *that* much of a big dumb gaijin!. (waves barbed wire bat in @Laz 's direction)

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

To the surprise of no one, both WrestleGrandSlam shows have been canceled. It’s the right thing to do. Probably should have been done a lot sooner but I can kind of see why they held out hope.

 

[Slayer]

Totally the right move, both for public safety sake and also not to waste two big events on capped crowds, though am curious how (or if) they will handle the storylines during the interim

DG had to cancel all their shows between DOA and May 15th, and remains to be seen what will happen with their next scheduled shows on the 15th+16th in Fukuoka. After that is a trio of shows on the 21st-23rd in Sapporo, possibly one of the last "refuges" in the country ATM

Remains to be seen what happens with the aforementioned AJPW "Champions Night", currently set for May 16 at Ota Ward in Tokyo. I hope they can either delay it or have it at a facility with limited crowd, as I don't want to see Jake Lee wind up in the highly unenviable Drew McIntyre spot of having all his big ascendence storyline/wins happening at fanless shows

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

I have a feeling they knew that those shows would probably be postponed for a while since they didn't build many matches for the show (I still haven't watched the Dontaku shows so maybe they're crammed in a lot of shit there but I didn't get that impression reading the recaps). I think only official announced match was Ospreay Vs Okada.

I'm assuming that'll get pushed back to whatever their next show is without a capped at 5,000 or less crowd. .Whenever that will be. Like Lee in AJPW, I highly highly doubt they want to waste Okada winning back the title on a small crowd. Good news for Ospreay since it'll undoubtedly extend his title run.

 

[Slayer]

Like Lee in AJPW, I highly highly doubt they want to waste Okada winning back the title on a small crowd.

TBF Ota Ward is only 4000 standard capacity so even if they had to cut that down by a quarter, 1000 is still a pretty good crowd for All Japan, especially in light of the pandemic.

It's the potential of a no-fan show that worries me re: wasting the title win

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

Q&A with Yuji Nagata - Monthly Puroresu

Yuji Nagata spoke with Monthly Puroresu beforehis AEW battle against Jon Moxley! Read Nagata's views on the LA Dojo, returning to TNT & more!

monthlypuroresu.com

A rare English language interview with Nagata on his match tonight with Moxley.

Interesting that the guy in the USA is probably the safest member of the New Japan roster right now.

 

[Slayer]

All Japan's Champions Night at Ota Ward with the Suwama/Lee Triple Crown match was originally slated for tonight but for obvious reasons has been postponed to June 26th

Bad as the situation has been, admittedly I've been mildly amused how it's given Suwama a far longer TC reign than AJPW had likely intended when he beat Kento (3/23/20, for reference)

 

[Slayer]

The first Dragon Gate Fukuoka show ran this morning as scheduled with limited attendance, and I expect tonight's show to run as well

As makeup for the cancelled Tokyo shows that would have been last weekend, DG held the scheduled KOG matches from those events at their dojo/TV studio (no fans obv) and posted them on their site the other day, so there's all my puro for this weekend

 

[Cackling Co Pilot Kamala]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1394387595816280067