February 2006

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Against All Odds 2006 - X-Division Champion Samoa Joe vs Christopher Daniels vs AJ Styles At first, I was like am I crazy or is this better than the more heralded Unbreakable match and after the sick Joe/AJ combo Back Drop Driver head drop on Daniels, it was pretty clear this is the better match. It is tighter and more efficient clocking in at around 16 minutes of action. There are just as many MOVEZ~! (aforementioned sick head drop, the monkey flip callback this time into a Boston Crab, Joe's suicide dive with AJ bumping like a champ). However, this time the match is structured so much better! Joe comes off as such a badass in this match. He dominates pretty much the ent…

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I'm over this Chris Benoit vs. Booker T feud but at least we got some closure here. The match was too long for the crowd's tastes, however they stuck to their guns and worked a fairly solid bout. Booker has a decent act with his wife, and he works had in the ring, but I was grateful that he tapped out so that they can move on from this feud.

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Randy Orton vs Rey Mysterio - WWE No Way Out 2006 "C'mon Randy, he's a midget." - Fan in front row There's nothing novel about this match, but I thought it was an excellent execution based on traditional wrestling fundamentals. I thought Orton gave an excellent performance of a despicable slimeball heel. Definitely one of his best performances of 2003-2007, wrestling was moving away from traditional heels, but Orton really did a great job in this one. He was so cocky in looming Rey over with his size and manhandling him. Those shit-eating grins were perfect. You really wanted to see him eat a boot to the face. That's exactly what you got out of the short Rey shine…

This was a fun, high energy 6-man that set the tone for the buildup to WrestleMania. I was particularly impressed with the exchanges between FInlay and Mysterio and Benoit and JBL. In fact, if Benoit and JBL had worked a proper feud with as many PPV matches as Eddie and JBL had, I have no doubt that they would have produced a great match. I'm a big JBL guy, but I thought they had outstanding chemistry here and it's a matchup that excites me. Finlay and Rey also had potential to have a great match. It's a shame that they weren't given the freedom to do so.

Ito looked somewhat unpolished here, he has nice kicks and I liked his palm strike flurries but he doesn't seem to have much clue how to work and time his stuff. Usuda carried him through the mat exchanges and executed some really cool holds, love his Wakigatame/bodyscissors. Finishing stretch was neat as they finally started going after each other with brutal stand up exchanges but the match didn't really seem to click before that as they'd just awkwardly reset after every sequence, though a great TKO finish will make me quickly forget the bout's shortcomings. ***-***1/4

I am saddened that Alan Karaev will be reduced to a mere trivia question now that I've watched both of his pro wrestling matches. He instantly "got it" and would bust out all these great palm strikes, knees, slams etc. For shame. Shibata isn't as good as Usuda so he mostly played face in peril here. I liked the way Karaev fought out of the first leglock and a flash submission finish was about as good of a way to get Shibata the win as there was. ***

I lost it when I saw this existed, Murakami-Nagata is a New Japan MOTD candidate and we get to see them go at it again, life is good. Enson Inoue is a guy I assume was universally hated at SSS ten years ago that I totally love and I'm not sure whether this was before or after Iizuka was broken down, I'l assume before because I'd like to stay positive and think BML wouldn't book someone that bad. And also he's still a face here and he turned heel after the injury so. My only problem with this is that Nagata has already picked some of his annoying quirks here like his goofy selling (especially the facial expressions he makes while doing so) and I also find his slapping styl…

I was kinda surprised not to see any reviews of this match as this seems like the kind of match people would have opinions about. Anyway, I watched it via the Bloodstained Honor DVD (that I somehow got from the Cleveland Public Library, which is its own kind of awesome). I'm guessing that people who were watching ROH regularly might be even higher on this match because of the build-up and knowledge of the characters, their motivations, reputations, etc. Watching this "cold" with only a tiny bit of knowledge of the match, I still really enjoyed it for what it was... This one starts before a bell can even be rung, Cabana going right after Homicide (literally chasi…