January 2006

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Masato Tanaka vs. Daisuke Sekimoto - BJW - 02/01/2006 I guess it's apt that the only place I can find this match, without looking deeper, is a porn site. It's rare I have to watch wrestling while going incognito yet here we are. All for a young Daisuke Sekimoto, who looks the exact same in 2006 as he does now in 2021. Ditto with Tanaka, really, although he's a bit thicker. This is a proto-strong division style match with a lot of heavy strikes and bomb throwing. It's not long before some of the more dangerous bumps come into play. Sekimoto reverses a suplex on the apron to hit one of his own, then Sekimoto later gets planted with a friend tornado ddt in the crowd onto a…

IWGP Champion Brock Lesnar vs Shinsuke Nakamura - NJPW Tokyo Dome 1/4/06 Wow Brock does it again! He only had four title matches in New Japan, but half of them been killer! This match was the opposite of the Akebono match which really shows Brock's range as a pro wrestler. The Akebono match was all about wrestling small, vulnerable and underneath. Here he wrestles so big and powerful. He is Mount Everest and a Grizzly Bear wrapped in one. Then only in the finish stretch he shows his vulnerability enough to make you believe Nakamura has a chance. In fairness to Nakamura, he wrestled really well here. I slagged him a lot in the Tenzan match for pedestrian selling and n…

They started thigs off with Shibata absolutely dominating, nailing Tanahashi with stiff kicks and slaps. That theme of Shibata having the upper hand made Tanahashi's comeback more special and I think being a FIP let's Tanahashi play to his strengths more-he has plenty of offence that looks just fine, but I find it much more interesting when his triangle crossbody gets counterd by a brutal Shibata knee than when he hits every sinle move in his arsenal in 50/50 matches. Tanahashi can be a good seller-it can backfire when he goes too deep into Shawn Michaels melodrama like in some of the Okada matches and the Styles G1 one but here it was closer to what you'll see Misawa do…

This would've been a great match if Nagata was as good as Murakami. The opening was sketchy as that was where Nagata had his shine, and it had him do weird slap-claps on Murakami's back, bad looking worked spots and just generally offence that would look bad for a house show tag, let alone a big Dome match, and his timing in general seemed off. Then we get to the meat of the match, which is Murakami's beatdown, and it rules every bit as much as you'd hope, he beats the hell out of Nagata with all sorts of awesome punching and kicking variations, awesome throws and so on. May not be the best one he's ever done, but still totally badass. Then it's time for Nagata's revenge …

In theory, these matches should be getting more exciting as the series goes longer, but they're not. Orton and Benoit have decent chemistry together, however there's only so much they can do if the match isn't laid out in a dramatic fashion. Basically, it finished with another BS ending to set-up the decider as a no-DQ match. That might have been okay if either man was on the verge of winning, but the match never got to that point. I'm not sure what was going on with the booking in the WWE as this kind of stuff is usually their bread and butter.

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Which ones of these names are not like the other ? Damn, the match already sucks and we're only about the intros. Ok, it'll only get better. Cena vs Michaels to open the match, which is quite the great match-up. Damn, the crowd HATES Cena at this point. He still displays way more poise and charisma than Roman Reigns though, not to mention he works way, way better. Either of these two guys end up being the MVP of the match. Carlito comes in. Seriously ? Well, he does try to kill himself a few times in the structure, so that kinda makes up for the fact he's a goon and not a main-eventer by any stretch of the imagination. He's ok here. But who can believe he can win …

I was mistaken about this being a No DQ match. They had a No Holds Barred match a few weeks later right before the Rumble. Orton controlled most of this bout through headlocks, which isn't a bad base to work from, but the crowd weren't as interested in it as I was. The WWE machine wasn't firing and there wasn't a ton of heat for this. Orlando Jordan did another unexplained run-in, and Booker and his wife were involved in the finish. Benoit forced Orton to tap while the ref was unconscious, so that Cole could gripe about the injustice of Booker's victory, but it was tough to get excited about this angle.

This is a fun display of athleticism. It starts off as a faced paced battle back and forth, and the only time it really slows down for a little bit is when AJ takes the advantage. He hits a sick Canadian Brainbuster onto Sydal on the outside ring apron. Later in the match Sydal hits a crazy moonsault onto AJ in the crowd. There are lots of cool and creative spots in this. I would say it's fun, but not a great match. It's pretty fast moving and I think the finishing spot looked neat, but didn't feel like a finish. I wasn't exactly sure who was hurting who until AJ rolled through for the pin. Overall, it's entertaining.

This is a very good match worth seeing on its own and a fine microcosm of the Danielson ROH reign as a whole. The ROH-CZW rivalry adds plenty of atmosphere. Seek it out and, if you haven’t seen it and have access to ROH’s 2006 shows (which, like most of the promotion’s early library are out of print and have not been released on the ROH Honor Club streaming service), I recommend going for the ride and checking out the entire seven-month run of shows. You can read my full review of the match here, as part of the 365 Wrestling project.

TNA X Division Champion Samoa Joe vs Christopher Daniels - Final Resolution 2006 The Joe vs Daniels rivalry is the least discussed of the three pairings of the main X Division competitors. I actually like Daniels and always think he does good work. I know some people dont care for him, but I would like to hear the knocks against him. There is something about him that screams midcard or ceiling I should say. Like you feel like Joe & AJ are main event players, but for some reason it does not feel like Daniels belongs in the main event and I dont know why. It is not size because AJ is just as big if not a little shorter. Anyways, I thought this was a great match bet…

This is for the WWE Championship, which Edge won from John Cena the week before by cashing in his Money in the Bank briefcase at New Years Revolution. Brutal match. Both guys take some big bumps, which is crazy considering Ric Flair's 57 years old and in his first ever ladder match. Lots of drama too. Everyone knows full well going into this match that there's no way Flair is winning the title, but boy do they make you almost believe when he tips Edge's ladder over sending him flying through a table to the outside, and then Ric starts climbing it himself with crowd on their feet cheering him up it! ****1/4

I think it's fair to say that the continuation of the Angle vs. Michaels rivalry failed to live up to the greatness of their WrestleMania match. You can probably also make the case that Angle's switch to RAW didn't live up to the hype. I don't think it's either wrestler's fault. The WWE simply wasn't firing on all cylinders at this point. Even in the WWE era, the product remains cyclical and this was not a hot period. Shawn vs. Vince does absolutely nothing for me. I can't imagine why anyone wanted to see that feud. The Vince I knew wanted to have Shawn Michaels' babies. This is a solid bout where Michaels' career is on the line. There's a modicum of drama, but Angle is s…

Perfect David vs. Goliath type match with both guys playing their role excellently. This maybe the best Mark Henry match ever. He is incredible here working as a monster heel using his strength to just steamroll and maul Rey. And as we all know, it's well documented Rey is an all-time great who excels in multiple roles so you know he's great here working from underneath. Rey using his speed to chop down Henry with a variety of 619's to different parts of the body was fantastic. However that finish with Henry just sitting up from the frog splash and then just brutally slamming down Rey was picture perfect. Very good sub 10 minute TV match.

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A very good 20 minute match that could've been a great 10-15 minute match. Akebono is the focal point of the match-whenever he's in the ring the match is on track. The crowd is livid at the idea of him facing off with Kobashi, and the early sequences clash Kobashi's tenacity with Akebono's sheer size, and it ends up with Akebono running over Kobashi. Unfortunately the Akebono-less pairings deliver nothing for most of the match, you'd think Kobashi was Go Shiozaki by the reactions his offence was getting and his insistance on doing shitty downward chops. The action picks up once Rikio fires up, no-sells Kobashi's pedestrian offence and corners him with sumo palm strikes. F…

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This was supposed to be Joe vs. Daniels but apparently Joe had a staph infection and wasn't cleared to wrestle. So, they gave us this return matchup from the early days of ROH wrestling, which would have been cool if there had been more at stake. They made a go of it, and it was a decent match, but ROH tries to hype every bout as special which makes it stand out more when the workers come up short.

This was slightly better than their previous bout as they were allowed to go out there and wrestle without an interference. No Holds Barred basically amounted to a few weapon shots and the odd chokehold or two. Once again, your mileage may vary on how interesting you find Orton working holds. I have a soft spot for him after his Evolution run, but he's not the smoothest technician. Benoit's work was okay but nothing you haven't seen before.

This was a good match, but not the Match of the Year contender you'd expect from two wrestlers of this caliber. In some ways, it suffered from the same shackles as the Christopher Daniels vs. Low Ki match in that the commentators couldn't stop talking about how legendary the early ROH bouts were. While it's true that those were the bouts that put ROH on the map, it's a heavy weight to carry around when working a return bout, especially when you know the fanbase has delusions of grandeur about ROH matches being like 90s All Japan. This wasn't a Triple Crown classic but more of a Champion Carnival match. Still a good match, but left you wanting more.

World Heavyweight Champion Kurt Angle vs Mark Henry - Royal Rumble 2006 After missing most of 2004 & 2005, Mark Henry was pushed as a main event talent on Smackdown. He was not yet Hall of Pain, Mark Henry, but there were glimmers of it in this performance. His facial expressions at the beginning of the match were spot on. From Angle trying to takedown Mark, what are you doing little man. To cat & mouse, his frustration. Angle punches and the way he catches the fist and breaks him down and lays the badmouth on him. Hall of Pain Mark Henry is inside there. He throws Angle up onto the ropes twice. Splash gets two. This match is built around Mark Henry being able…