POLL 5/22 -5/28 - WHAT WAS THE BEST FREE TV MATCH OF THE WEEK?

[John E. Dynamite]

This was a tricky week, to put it nicely. The last poll was a little bit compromised on the first page and a lot of my weekend watching was dominated by PPVs. DYNAMITE/RAMPAGE, SMACKDOWN, and IMPACT were all go-home shows, Ring of Honor was strange and never-ending, NJPW was a rehash of the BoSJ stuff the company already released for free BUT thank the lord for Mike Bailey + a free NJPW WORLD show. Big time main event from GLEAT! Title changes in Mexico, a more than adequate RAW, Derby City's continued excellence. There's good stuff here. Links later. ALSO I left a spot open because I am almost 100% sure I am forgetting something.

Edited June 5, 2023 by John E. Dynamite

[Eivion]

Thought there were plenty of nice matches between Raw, NXT, Dynamite, and Smackdown. Still, the standouts were easily Frazer/Dar & OC/Fletcher. Both were soooo damn good and I hope all give them a watch. If I were voting right now it would likely be for the NXT match though I still have Lucha and NJPW to go through. I can see either of the BOSJ semis matching up well. 

Edited June 1, 2023 by Eivion

[John E. Dynamite]

When I said that my weekend was dominated by PPVs, I should have also included the best Battlebots finale of all time (almost as good as Robot Wars Series 5!), a bunch of sumo wrestling and my *true* match of the week, the second half of the first episode of Xena: Warrior Princess. Seriously, they work it like a Royal Rumble and you'd swear the lead villain could be the true leader of the Bloodline. It's fab.

Matches - 

NJPW Best of the Super Juniors 5/26 FULL SHOW (Semi-Finals)
https://njpwworld.com/p/s_00651_23_1

BULK Orchestra (Check Shimatani & Hayato Tamura) (c) vs. 60 Seconds (Jun Tonsho & Tetsuya Izuchi) - GLEAT
https://youtu.be/M0amS7WzNO0?t=7623

Derby City Wrestling
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HeIj6hrwRoU

Dr. Wagner & Black Taurus vs. Negro Casas & DMT Azul - Invasion Indy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWhD_ONF-Ko

MLW Fusion
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MPL_axldGM

CMLL Viernes Espectacular
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8UbnACog6E

CMLL Martes De Arena Mexico - Angel De Oro vs. Esfinge
https://www.youtube.com/live/LvaMEro_A-g?feature=share&t=5480

 

[Marcel]

Lucha Bros vs. Claudio/Wheeler was the winner for me this week, but I also enjoyed Bailey/Takahashi from NJPW on AXS.  Always liked Hiromu and Bailey's kicks look good....except for his comical Trouble In Paradise homage where he does two full rotations before landing the kick. Woof.

[John E. Dynamite]

The "sleeper" on this list isn't really that much of a sleeper - you should probably try n watch Mike Bailey vs. Chris Sabin. Especially if you didn't get enough Speedball and wish he was in the BoSJ Final. It was weird watching Bailey try to be the hero of Wrestlemania weekend, where he absolutely overworked himself and failed to create any classic matches despite giving it what felt like a dozen tries. But right when I thought I was getting sick of him, he got OVER over in NJPW and is coming off like a bigger deal in his IMPACT matches. There's a world where I vote for Sabin/Bailey over Despy/Titan.

[username]

For the sake of accuracy I will note that the MLW Fusion match was actually Juicy Finau vs. Damian 666 vs Crazy Frank; it was not the best match of the week.

[Eivion]

Ended up voting for Frazer/Dar to make sure I had something in, but the BOSJ semis were every bit as great and had bigger crowds to up things notch atmosphere wise. Could have easily voted for any of the three.