July 2018

I know I'm overrating this match, but I loved this with all the counters and reversals with a great closing and some great near falls. Love these 13 minute type sprint matches that make the G1 great. ****

The past 2 years, these two have put on my MOTY. While this isn’t gonna be my MOTY, this was still damn good. This is the kind of stuff we expect from high end G1 matches in the modern era. You had great callbacks, great sequences, pretty much the best off from their past matches. If this went a little bit longer, I would’ve went 5, but 4.75 ain’t bad either. ****3/4

Never have I seen two completely opposite styles mesh so well together. The best part about this match is Sabre going after kicks to prove a point that he can beat his opponents at their strength and Ibushi showing him how it's done. A battle of which style would be the better of the two with Ibushi coming out on top. Will re-watch this later, because I missed the middle of the match, but it was great from that point to the finish. ****1/4

Yano tends to be a pretty polarizing wrestler but count me among those who love his antics and G1 sprints. That being said, I was expecting a decent match and nothing more. How wrong I was. Yano's declaration that he would not cheat this entire tournament led to one of the most creative and fun NJPW matches I've seen in some time. Yano stays true to his word from the beginning by trading forearms with Ishii and even getting the better of him by relying on his rarely-used grappling skills. He even no-sold a German suplex! Still, Ishii being tougher and stronger would force Yano's hand as he found himself straying back to his old ways (eye rakes and using the exposed turnbu…

Hey, it's a Yuki Ishikawa match in 2018. The 51-year old can still go, although he's obviously slowed down. This was a pretty fun match with some cool spots. Ishikawa's ground game is still better than guys half his age, and it looked like he was having a lot of fun in there rolling around the mat. I liked how he elbowed Hara in the back of the head to set up the Fujiwara armbar and he hits his always great grapevine German suplex. Also liked the arm control late in the match. Hara's sold enough, which has kind of been his entire career, with some decent strikes. He gets a cool flying armbar takedown to Ishikawa's slap attempt and after he dumps Ishikawa with a release Ge…

This was outstanding. Simple psychology with Rusev targeting AJ's mid-section to try wear him down & soften him up for the Accolade. AJ answers by going after the leg of Rusev. The selling by both men is simply fantastic, in particular Rusev put on an absolute clinic in that regard. Absolutely LOVED the moment where he had to keep his leg down while having AJ in the Accolade. One of the best WWE matches of the year. ****1/4

Going to post my full review on my blog (Kwang The Blog), but was particularly interested in others' feelings about this match. Let's discuss! Seth Rollins vs. Dolph Ziggler in a 30-Minute Ironman Match for the WWE Intercontinental Championship. Going into this, critics and fans were somewhat split - on the one hand, Seth Rollins has been a roll, having great matches on TV and drawing the best crowd responses of his career. Ziggler, meanwhile, is almost his perfect physical foil and his partnership with Drew McIntyre has helped revitalized a very stale character (the less we say about the "music-less entrance" gimmick the better). On the other hand, Rollins and Ziggl…

Page is proving that he is more than deserving of his spot with an absolute banger of a match with Elgin. Took some time for the crowd to get into it, but once they did, then the match took off. It was a great back and forth match with some great near falls toward the end. Gonna be an under the radar G1 match. ****

This was heading towards a great match and while I understand they layout for Jay's character doesn't mean I enjoy it. It became too much in the end for me. Outside of one match, Jay has yet to really show that he has that extra gear to make a match great, and when he figures that out, he will be great, but for now he'ss just good-really good. Not on the level of most Tanahashi main events but he was still really good as well and a perfect foil for Jay. Better than their WK match. ***3/4

An absolute slugfest of a match. Enjoyed this one a little bit more than their Anniversary match. Kinda similar to Suzuki's Tanahashi match on Day 1 with Suzuki dominating most of the match only to be on the losing end. The last 5 minutes were great with them trading strikes and Makabe has been really great so far, a lot better than past years. Super fun match ***3/4

An awesome match. Who knew if you put three talented men in a match and give them time that they were gonna have a great match? Better than anything on Extreme Rules with non stop action. Everyone got a chance to shine and look great with a hot crowd adding to it. Triple Threats are my one of my favorite match types. ****

A great tv match between two of the best wrestlers in the world. Both of their movesets are amazing and here, together, they gave a little class about how to work an 'arsenal exhibition' kind of match: with perfect timing and giving value to every move and strike. Really loved the finish also, some CalfCrusher credibility is always good. Man, I hope they have the chance of main eventing a PPV this year for the title because that would be incredible. ***1/2.

This was a very good, back and forth match with Juice dropping another match. Ibushi pulled out some of the big guns to put Juice away, but Juice keeping fight back. A very even match. Wish this went a little longer, then it would have hit the great range for me, but this was a nice teaser to hopefully a second math between the two. ***3/4

Now this was my jam. This matchup has yet to give anything less than a great match. It was hard hitting, played off their previous matches well, and had a super hot crowd to boot. Both guys worked to their strengths with Ishii' striking and Naito's ability to piss Ishii off only adding to the match. Great, great match with it being one of the best of the tournament in the end. ****1/2

Thanks to a less hectic work schedule (which still has me running quite behind), I'm able to watch the whole G1 this summer, and I made the probably maniacal decision to watch the undercard tags as well. This won't make any MOTY list, but I thought it was a very entertaining opener. Jay White and Elgin bring the thunder on the chops early, although this was hindered somewhat by Elgin going crazy with the leg slaps on strikes down the stretch. Narita is probably my favorite Young Lion in NJPW right now, in terms of showing fire and teasing near-falls that seem believable even though we all know he has no chance of winning. Him and Yoh combine for some good stuff down the …

Absolutely fantastic. Most of the match is ZSJ just torturing Yano, but Yano keeps on escaping, and gets a few absolutely TREMENDOUS, best of the year -level, nearfalls in. Couldn't have asked for a better match between the 2. ****1/4

Omega & Goto always work well together and this was no different. The weakest of their trilogy with my investment not as high as their other two. Never expected Goto to win, but they did a good job at making you believe that he might. Excellent match to cap off a very good day. ****1/4

Maybe the best match out of Block A through the first three sets of round-robin matches... I've been a Page guy for a while, and I recognize he appears to be somewhat of a polarizing wrestler around here, but I thought he came off spectacular in defeat. A couple of spots that didn't make sense, like the super-dangerous suicide dive when Okada was prone and didn't appear to make any contact, but he definitely got himself over with the Korakuen crowd. We also had the mid-match change for Okada from this happy-go-lucky persona to not-fucking-around Okada. Easily one of the standout matches through the first quarter of G1 for me.

This won't make any MOTY list or anything like that, but I was somewhat surprised to see it hasn't been mentioned here yet. Just a good, solid, hard-hitting match. The brawl up into the crowd won me over, capped by EVIL's grown-man-sized bump on the concrete. The battle of lariats really drove it home. It didn't have the usual array of NJPW false finishes, but that actually made the match seem fresher to me. Right guy won, too. I'm not usually a Makabe guy, but all three of his G1 matches to this point has been, at least, good, which is more than I can say for most of his block and at least half of the field. I thought there was a lot to like here.

Fujita in Big Japan rules. The stiff exchanges between he and Daichi were the best things Daichi's been involved in all year. Hard slaps, big knees, mean elbows from Fujita. At one point, he gets busted the hell open with a spinning heel kick from Daichi that clips his brow. Even after the match, those two are still beating on each other. Sekimoto and Kamitani were pretty good too -- love Sekimoto's backbreaker -- but you're really only in this to see Fujita.

A decent match, nothing more, nothing less. Uto is your typical paint-by-number bruiser and doesn't really do too much here. Suzuki's armwork is brutal -- I liked him catching Uto's sliding lariat with the Fujiwara armbar -- and between the joint manipulation and knees, Suzuki does a strong job of working it over. Uto's selling, however, isn't great and within a few minutes, he's back to using the arm, no problem. That being said, there were some cool spots in the match. Hideki's lariat to Uto looked nasty and Hideki later takes a pretty stiff lariat from Uto. I also liked the finish, with Suzuki going back to the arm following the double arm suplex and submitting Uto wit…

More than one year since their first singles match, and man did they do this one even better. Juice of early 2017 and Juice in mid-2018 are worlds away in talent and star power. Naito was like a shark smelling blood in this match as he instinctivley attacked Juice's injured hand quickly into the match. The real meat of the match though was Juice pulling out all the stops. I'm surprised Juice actually managed to get cheers over Naito at points. I won't say these guys didn't have chemistry the first time they faced off, but they for sure showed it this time around, ****1/2.

Such a lovely time, this match was. One of my favorite things about it was seeing how much of a blast everyone involved was having - Ibushi seemed the most excited he's been in a while about a match, the crowd was loving every moment & even the cameramen were smiling from ear to ear. Fantastic mix of genuinely amusing comedy & serious storytelling w/ Yano giving Ibushi real trouble w/ his new found motivation in displaying his amateur wrestling skills + his classic shenanigans. ****

Super smooth & exciting back and forth technical wrestling all the way through. I prefer their New Japan Cup match just a bit more, but this was an absolutely awesome sequel. SANADA & Zack Sabre Jr. have a great chemistry with each other, and their matches feel pretty unique in today's New Japan. ****

Match of the tournament so far and the kind of hard-hitting, meat and potatoes match-up I love. Ishii's selling in this match was terrific, from the way he took Goto's kicks to the lariat battle later in the match, with Ishii falling into the ropes and then both collapsing in one of the most convincing ways. Loved Ishii punching out of the sleeper hold and then the way he responds to Goto's slap to the face, just beating him down in the corner. The big lariat toward the end looked really brutal and then, of course, the final headbutts building to the finish. Really good stuff.