July 2019

Loved this match. Both men came in hurt and both viciously attacked the wounded body parts of the other. Ospreay's initial attack on Ibushi's leg in particular is some gnarly stuff. There's a brutal looking spot where he steps on Ibushi's toes and then just stomps on his ankle. Nasty. Of course, we all know Ibushi is a master of dropping people on their necks and boy did he make Ospreay bump for him in this match. Loved all the callbacks to their WK match with Ibushi countering the Hidden Blade but also being completely rocked by it in the finishing stretch. Thought that Ibushi's sustained selling after the Hidden Blade was some of the best from him that I've ever seen. L…

Yes. Ishii getting right up in Moxley's grill to start gave this a big fight feel that separated it from other G1 matches. They don't waste any time at all in this match, filling with all the fun stuff you want out of these two. You get the wild crowd brawling, you get the fun Ishii no-sells, you get the strike exchanges, you get the plunder baybay, and also ISHII COMING OFF THE TOP THROUGH A TABLE. WHAT DID I JUST SEE? Both guys were clearly fired up getting to work this match and that energy and passion shows. Easily Moxley's best match since leaving the WWE and also the best match of the G1 so far. A wild brawl filled with fantastic moments all throughout. …

This absolutely lived up to the hype and personal expectations, as the build to this moment had been phenomenal and really set the stage for this singles encounter. This was a true "coming of age" performance from Nomura, where he didn't look like the cutesy little ass-kicker but a legit bulked up threat to Okabayashi's title reign. His transitions and groundwork have improved a lot and his kicks only continue to get more precise and sharper. The story was obvious going into this match, with Nomura targeting the bandaged left arm, and everything surrounding that storied ruled. I feel like Okabayashi is still so underrated when it comes to being one of the absolute best at…

They beat the crap out of each other with lariats, forearms, jabs, knees -- you name it. It's already extremely enjoyable with that, but what put it to that next level was the leg psychology with Moxley being pretty damn vicious & very focused on the attack + Shingo selling very well throughout. Great performances by both resulted in a great match. ****

This is for Hoshiki's Wonder of Stardom title. These two have had a bit of a rivalry that has been going on for the last few months, with them even going as far as teasing a hair match between the two. The biggest strength of this match was it's ability to switch things up while still being coherent as a whole. They do a little bit of everything in this match. There's the obvious striking but they also managed to mix in brawling, working holds and the usual exchange of big moves down the stretch but the match never feels disjointed. This results in the match having a different feel from your typical Japanese title match that we've seen the last few years. A freaking fanta…

This was probably my most awaited match-up of the entire tournament, and while I don't think it was as amazing as it could've been, it was still a kick-ass time from bell to bell. KENTA just slowly decimates Okada for most of the match, and it's awesome; stuff like him baiting Okada to try and hit him in the neck, only for him to trip him down & put on a neckhold, was really neat. Though I have to mention that some key moments, mostly by KENTA on the offense, felt surprisingly heatless & had no drama -- the two Triangle spots are perfect examples of this, especially the second one where he transitioned it into the Game Over, to pretty much no reaction from the cro…

Random time limit draws are hard to pull off but somewhere in here is a great 15:00 or 20:00 match. I like Shiozaki a lot but I don't know if he was the right guy to have a 30:00 draw with Hideki Suzuki. That being said, Hideki worked this match very differently than previous draws against guys like Daisuke Sekimoto. One of the biggest criticisms I've seen of Hideki is his lack of selling but here, especially in the final minutes with him taking all those elbow shots to the dead, his selling was phenomenal. The match was a series of cool moments but the bigger match was slow and clunky, with a lot of start-stop momentum. While I love Hideki picking apart a limb, it dragge…

14 minutes of two dudes kicking ass. Dickinson asked for this match months ago and it seems he's been wanting to face Daisuke for years so you knew he was going to go all out on his dream match, he did not disappoint. Not a lot of story here, it's basically the two of them taking turns trying to beat the shit out of the other, with Sekimoto being more dominant and Dickinson having to find extra energy to keep up. Fucking LOVED the finishing sequence because it was incredibly intense, had the crowd going crazy and the visuals of the sweat flying off with every stiff strike were outstanding, also loved that for as intense as it was, it didn't have any excess. I was eager to…

Talk about it here

I'm still pissed off at not being able to watch the Osaka show, but holy shit this was fucking AWESOME way better than their match a couple of weeks prior - which was mainly a good build up to Nomura vs Okabayashi - as this one had everyone fully involved and doing compelling stuff. For the most part it was the Fuminori Abe show, my dude is just fucking great at being a little cunt motherfucker be strutting, interfering, doing sneaky shit on the apron, kicking and slapping the shit out of his seniors, he had the most unconventional and compelling face in peril segment I've seen in a long ass time. Give this man a raise and an award. Other stuff to love was Nomura and Yu…