sevendaughters
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Posts posted by sevendaughters
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What frustrates me about Sanada beyond the two atrocious moves that he does is that I feel that, piecing bits of his career together, be it the babyface we saw in TNA, the wrestling we saw in Wrestle-1 and AJPW, and the persona we see through his social media, there is a megastar there. He is handsome, he was trained by Muta, and he can really work. I still have hope for nearly anyone in NJPW because they've shown they can heat people back up.
As for EVIL - he's not a main-eventer yet. I have hopes for him beyond being a bruiser, but I am fairly bored of interefering cheaty shit, and I don't think Bullet Club signifies anything now. What I took to be an interesting and slightly post-modern gimmick is actually, in hindsight, the beginning of a conveyor belt of fairly goofy shit that leads to O Khan and Master Wato.
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This is a card that could have six good matches on or only one.
Imagine we're going to see some monkeyshines in the O Khan match unless Ospreay is booked elsewhere.
In fact the last three matches combined could feature more interference than a '98 Nitro.
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Back to Osaka for another minimal-looking card with a bit of interest scattered
NJPW "POWER STRUGGLE 2020", 07.11.2020
EDION Arena Osaka
1. KOPW 2020: Toru Yano (c) vs. Zack Saber Jr.
2. NEVER Openweight Title: Minoru Suzuki (c) vs. Shingo Takagi
3. Special Singles Match: Kazuchika Okada vs. Great-O-Khan
4. IWGP US Heavyweight Title Contendership: KENTA (c) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi
5. Tokyo Dome IWGP Heavyweight & IWGP Intercontinental Double Title Contendership: Kota Ibushi (c) vs. Jay White
6. IWGP Heavyweight & IWGP Intercontinental Title: Tetsuya Naito (c) vs. "King of Darkness" EVIL
(from purolove.com)
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Feel like NJPW set such a high bar with the G1 that this tournament - to me at least - feels a mite disappointing. Maybe if the crowds had been able to vocalise it would have been different. There were some things to do with match patterns and interference that I would have disliked even if the matches were taking place in front of 100000 of the loudest people on earth. For the most part I felt detached, aside from a half-dozen matches that really drew me in (I haven't finished yet, and I will).
Taichi and Cobb went up in my estimation, while Juice and Evil went down. The rest stayed approximately the same, which is fine, because I like nearly everyone in the tournament to some degree.
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am way behind here (don't mind spoilers, as a superior being I am here just for the art of Yujiro trudging slowly) but I skipped on to Day 13, which I heard some of the most amazing rave reviews for. I liked the show a lot but 5.25 for Ibushi-Suzuki is the final nail in the coffin of believing DAVE as an accurate match-rater. As for his claim that it was the best night of G1 blocks ever, then I just think he must be on glue.
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The opening seconds of KENTA v EVIL have me thinking that while fans can't actually boo they need to limit the powdering and shitcanning the early sections of matches. There's a thousand ways to be heel but right now your job is to get these people involved. Heel vs heel match and the crowd were clapping like crazy, then KENTA rolls out of the ring and flattens them. Hope it picks up. Maybe silence is his true home, coming from NOAH.
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17 hours ago, doctorhbomb said:
The next three matches were interesting, since they seemed to match up folks who either liked each other or were part of the same stable. Tanahashi vs. Yoshi-Hashi had an air of friendly rivalry around it. Overall pretty fun, but I can't recall much about it at the moment. Tanahashi is just so good at the NJPW main event style (which isn't my favorite, but still); better than anyone else right now. Crowd loved it.
This was the most recent match I watched (gonna try and watch the last two Night 8 matches on the train to work now) and I looooved it. Tanahashi worked Yoshihashi like he was the second coming of Kensuke Sasaki or something, working that crowd as if he could only win with them on his side, and they ate that shit up. As I get a bit older I start to feel like the mark of a great wrestler has something to do with how they get you involved in a reasonably low stakes match (like, ok, Tanahashi kayfabe needs to win, but really Tanahashi doesn't NEED to do anything) like this. Objectively it wasn't as good as Tana vs. Naito or a couple of high-end Ishii matches, but as an expression of how wrestling can be really GREAT, I loved it as much as anything I've seen since the Dome.
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Up to Day 7. I'll just keep to the notables for now.
- Is it me or is Yujiro showing some mild babyface fire and sympathetic traits?
- Cobb v Ibushi was what this tournament perhaps needs more of: short, energetic, clean finish with not too much spam.
- Willing to be patient while Okada does the 2020 version of the balloon gimmick. Bad back, new finisher (which I like!), go with it, use the G1 to test it.
- Ishii v Shingo was a delight for me. Fair enough if you couldn't buy any pinfall attempt pre-finish but I just like seeing them mix it.-
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Night 5: again mostly solid but nothing got me pounding my chest at the giddy thrill of it all, and Okada/White disappointed me.
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just finished Night 4. Yoshihashi-EVIL was the best proper match of the night and Yano-Tanahashi was a fun Yano match. Sabre-Naito went for an epic that landed short (some good stuff, but would have been good at half the length) and the other two were solid. I'm enjoying this all thus far but have to say the smaller crowds are hurting it a little.
Naito-Tanahashi the best so far by a short head from Ishii-Suzuki, then everything else a long way back.
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I haven't seen night 5 (or 4) yet but I'm trying to hang with the Okada submission sub-plot. Since KUSHIDA and Kyle left and Shibata got bonced there's been a real dearth of proper submission stuff: Suzuki does some but partly to cheat, Sabre's are fanciful and entertaining, Tanahashi has got the Cloverleaf over, but SANADA's looks like crap, Naito's is just an extension of his taunt, and outside of that there's not a lot! I'm not saying they should go RINGS but it wouldn't harm things if they had people who could exchange holds on quieter nights rather than shitty walk'n'brawl around the ringside.
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Just coming to the end of night 3 after a day on the sickbed catching up. Naito-Tanahashi was so good. You run out of superlatives with those two. Excellent match that would surely work in most promotions in the last 30 years.
Really like J1 taunting the fans for not being allowed to open their mouths. He's not the Pacific Ric Flair but he is certainly something.
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After my big fighting words of returning to G1 I only just sat down now to watch everything back-to-back. Suzuki-Ishii the clubhouse leader after 3 matches. They went at each other like the apes in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Great finish too.
I'm going to root for Yujiro though. He's got such 2010 Zero1 energy these days, he doesn't even feel like a NJPW dojo guy anymore. He feels like a last minute desperation ringer who doesn't know how to Douki his way into favour.
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take the positives, Raw Underground is now an established segment.
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A slapjack is a weapon favoured by street toughs of the 1950s and 1960s: the pool ball in a sock is a homebrew version of the classic slapjack.
Similarly, a mace is a weapon that has lost favour in recent years. Usually the classic mace comprises of a long straight shaft with a sharp point and various gouging devices around the tip.
A t-bar? Arguably the most threatening of the bunch: it is a high street venue for old ladies to eat cakes and imbibe hot liquid.
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Hey everyone.
Had the summer off wrestling completely. Not felt like watching any, COVID or not. Thought I might be done.
G1 lineup has revived me. Gonna re-up next week and get back on board.
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some of the normal matches were ok but this was the worst Wrestlemania by a factor of 20. Historically speaking I wasn't into the Backlot Brawl, the Boiler Room Brawl, any Empty Arena brawl, Final Deletion, or Lucha Underground (sadly). I hate (genuinely!) to be a curmudgeon but wrestling, for me, is a live art. It needs an audience. It needs to feel like it's happening (not bothered if it's taped) there in front of paying fans or I am just not interested. The various styles on the night can differ: I'm not asking everyone be Kiyoshi Tamura.
I am even less interested in bad overlong cinema-style wrestling. I'm not into 'cinematic wrestling'. Fight scenes in films don't hold up past a certain length. People used to shit on backyard wrestling - I don't see how AJ-Taker was anything other than bad backyard wrestling elevated to PPV status. Don't even get me started on the Symbolism 101 dullness of Wyatt-Cena. I think Wyatt might be the worst guy at creating wrestling characters. Beneath Nick Dinsmore.The only thing that was so bad that it transcended was the Benoit-suicide referencing torture marathon of Orton-Edge. I genuinely could not believe what I was seeing. Up there with that Michael Jackson performance at the Brits where he made out like he was Jesus healing kids of their pain.
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Aldis in NWA
Scurll in ROH
just need the Drake "Spud" Maverick sleeper cell to wake up in WWE
and we witness the worldwide birth of
R I C K Y K N I G H T I S M-
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I find it hard to assess Okada wrt those greats whose careers are done or very nearly done. Undeniably a HOF career already and has probably done more for NJPW worldwide than Tanahashi. Athletically impressive, crisp, and we've seen him grow up in front of our eyes (remember how awkward his promos used to be?) He's had some incredible matches for sure and I look forward to where he's going as much as I enjoy thinking about what he's done. The whole dance around the Rainmaker has largely changed how matches are laid out and end these days (I remember when NJPW matches seemed to finish with an almost uncontested run of moves ending with a finisher and that was it).
But I don't feel the same about him as I do or have done for Tanahashi, Shibata, or Kobashi. I find this a more reliable guide, ultimately.
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the DAVEs for anyone who gives a fuck, which he caveats by saying he was watching from an exec box and hasn't seen on TV and may not ever
1/4
Stardom tag 2.5
Young Lions tag 2.5
Old man tag 1.5
Liger tag 2.75 ("The fans hated this finish")
Suzukigun vs LIJ 2.75
CHAOS vs Bullet Club 2.75
Finlayjuice vs. GOD 3
Moxley vs Archer 3.5
Hiromu v Ospreay 5.25 ("This was the third best match in Tokyo Dome history at this point, although that only lasted about an hour")
Naito v White 4.5
Okada v Ibushi 5.5
1/5
Gauntlet 6-man tag star ratings for each match: 1.5, 1.25, 2, 2.25
Liger FINAL 3.5
Jr Tag 3.5 ("Yoh put Sho's cup in his mouth to celebrate. You really don't know where that thing has been. Actually, now that I think about it, you do, which makes it even more unnerving.")
Zack-Sanada 4
Moxley-Juice 2.75
Kenta-Goto 2.5 ("I want to make clear that most had this match far higher but where we were live it was dead. Evidently it was super hard hitting and in the Tokyo Dome that doesn’t mean as much.")
White-Ibushi 3
Jericho-Tanahashi 4.25
Okada-Naito 4.75
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3 hours ago, The Natural said:
Yes, a video played during Wrestle Kingdom 14 listing important events and dates in 2020.
I missed that (gf's flatmate clattering about).
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6 minutes ago, gordi said:
Apparently Osaka Jo Hall is already sold out
I guess that's going to be a mega show with the Olympics playing with the schedule. In fact do we know when other things are set to happen like G1 etc.?
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what's a Gabriel Kidd?
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interestingly - to my mind, at least - the G1 briefcase was a McGuffin to get us to the real weekend main event of Naito/Okada without the sigh of obviousness and feeling that it's all been done before. I doff my cap.
I also feel Ibushi's double loss will be redeemed at some point.
future directions all seem interesting. what are they going to do with Jay and Sanada? is this a faction thing?
Kenta is a good first defence and now it looks like they were really just building him for this since the G1. poor Goto. now the bridesmaid's bridesmaid.
as ever they have some megatalents just spinning their wheels in EVIL, Shingo, and Ishii. now Naito is on the double title you can't even see 2 of them making a token challenge. time to do something with the tags (this is my usage of this phrase in 2020, see you next year!)
NJPW G1 Climax 30.
in JAPAN
Posted
That's possible, @Teflon Turtle. To be honest, I don't need to see every match be this crazy all-out war. I still recall how absolutely brilliant AJ-Suzuki was with maybe 3 bumps and a whole lot of character work and classic pro wrestling dynamics. Yes, some of the guys do need to get wild for me to get into them because they're not as smart as Tanahashi or able to do what Sabre or Suzuki can with matwork, but I reckon you could have a thoroughly-entertaining night of G1 with PG rated violence.
I believe some of the diktats surrounding violence came from Meij, who is now gone. Whether this changes will be interesting.