NJPW Wrestling Dontaku 2014

[The Natural]

NJPW “WRESTLING DONTAKU 2014″, 5/3/14 (WPW/PPV/iPPV)

Fukuoka International Center

 

0. Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Tiger Mask, KUSHIDA & Yohei Komatsu vs. Captain New Japan, El Desperado, BUSHI & Mascara Dorada

1. IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Tag Team Title: Matt Jackson & Nick Jackson © vs. Rocky Romero & Alex Koslov

2. Special Tag Match: Toru Yano & Takashi Iizuka vs. Minoru Suzuki & Shelton Benjamin

3. NWA World Heavyweight Title: Satoshi Kojima © vs. Wes Brisco

4. Special Tag Match: Yuji Nagata & Manabu Nakanishi vs. Hirooki Goto & Katsuyori Shibata

5. IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title: Kota Ibushi © vs. Ryusuke Taguchi

6. NEVER Openweight Title: Tomohiro Ishii © vs. Tomoaki Honma

7. Special Elimination Match: Hiroshi Tanahashi, Togi Makabe, Tetsuya Naito & Jushin Thunder Liger vs. Karl Anderson, Doc Gallows, Bad Luck Fale & Tama Tonga

8. Wrestling vs. Jiu-jitsu MMA Fight: Shinsuke Nakamura & Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Daniel Gracie & Rolles Gracie

9. IWGP Heavyweight Title: Kazuchika Okada © vs. AJ Styles

 

Credit: puroresufan.com

 

Most interested in the main event.

[ultimoDANK]

The main event is a fresh matchup that's for sure. It'll be interesting to see AJ's take on the NJPW main event style.

You're right the rest of the card is rather weak. Taguchi can't beat Ibushi right? That would be shitty. For as great as NJPW is they need to do something about the Jr division. You knows it's bad when a randomly chosen Young Buck gets a title shot.

[Lazlo Woodbine]

I'm pretty pumped for the NEVER belt match most of all. The 6-man on the 19/4 show was great, can't go wrong with Ishii and Honma.

[GOTNW]

Taguchi should win the belt but I doubt he will. Maybe in a rematch after he wins BOSJ or something. Ishii-Honma will most certainly rule.

[Ultimo The Great]

Wow there's SO much of this i don't give a shit about

 

Apart from 4 & 6 i'd probably give this a miss if i didn't watch all the ippvs. 5 & 6 would be fine tv matches, Gracies can just fuck off and i've always been a Styles hater.

 

I'm getting a bad feeling that NJ are going to do something stupid like give Styles the belt.

[lostinube]

The main event is a fresh matchup that's for sure. It'll be interesting to see AJ's take on the NJPW main event style.

You're right the rest of the card is rather weak. Taguchi can't beat Ibushi right? That would be shitty. For as great as NJPW is they need to do something about the Jr division. You knows it's bad when a randomly chosen Young Buck gets a title shot.

 

The Young Bucks are the current Jr. Tag champs. Forever Hooligans are the forever challengers.

 

Not sure if I'm going this time (I've gone to the last four Dontaku shows). Because Golden Week starts on the 3rd this year, at this point there are no hotels left unless one wants to stay at the Seahawk for 400 dollars or so.

[NikkySan]

Dontaku consistently being the most uninteresting major NJPW show every year...

[rovert]

I'm getting a bad feeling that NJ are going to do something stupid like give Styles the belt.

 

It is transparently obvious that he is winning the title. Meltzer said he is .

[Ultimo The Great]

Wonderful

[Kevin Wilson]

Meltzer also said that Tanahashi was beating Okada last fall... but he didn't.  I mean he has a 50/50 chance of being right anyway.

[Ace]

Meltzer actually said the opposite, but somebody from New Japan kept disagreeing with him.

[wakigatame]

Yeah, someone from New Japan said Meltzer didn't understand business if he thought Tanahashi shouldn't headline the Tokyo Dome show.

[cool arrow]

Every foreign IWGP champion to date has been a hoss.  AJ is not a hoss, which wouldn't seem to bode well for him.  But who knows?

 

Anyway, the important question about this show is this:

 

Has there ever been a shittier wrestler involved in an NWA title match in Japan than Wes Brisco?

[Ace]

Michael Tarver.

[Salads]

We're in the pretty boy era. Not being a hoss works in AJ's favour.

[Raziel]

Michael Tarver.

I dunno, Big Daddy Yum-Yum might be worse.

[Ryan]

So, I guess that happened.

[Raziel]

I fucking HATE Bullet Club.

[RandomAct]

I'm ok with the result.  People are getting bent out of shape, but it's like everyone forgot that AJ is awesome.  Also, where else could you go with the Okada title run, in all honesty?

[John E. Dynamite]

I'm ok with the result.  People are getting bent out of shape, but it's like everyone forgot that AJ is awesome.  Also, where else could you go with the Okada title run, in all honesty?

 

Shibata, but they blew it, or Nakamura, but they didn't want to split up CHAOS?

 

Not really sure how I feel about the results. I definitely got the vibe AJ was going over, and I'm not against bringing some corny entertainment value to the otherwise-stoic product through dominant heel stables. The issues with the Bullet Club, to me, are that the heel antics always come off as forced and choreographed. Maybe if NJPW refs had ANY idea how to realistically bump, it would be different.

 

The company spent the top of the year cycling through the same rematches and booking things conservatively. Now they're going all willy-nilly in the other direction. I'm willing to see what will happen. Hopefully AJ drops the belt early, but I wouldn't be shocked if he's the champ throughout the G1. He could be the right guy to hand the belt over to a fresh champ like Shibata or Goto, even though I think the company should try to set up another long Nakamura run within the next year.

[Raziel]

Less the result and more how it came about. AJ shouldn't need 6 guys to help win.

[Kevin Wilson]

I don't mind Styles winning, he is a proven veteran and he won't pull a "Brock"... I am sure he will be an active participant in New Japan at least through whenever he loses it.  But I agree with Raziel in that I don't like all the interference with the Bullet Club, I think it takes away from the match.  I think Okada and Styles are both fantastic, the constant interruptions and shenanigans to me not only take away from the action but take away a bit of the 'big' victory for Styles.  I haven't watched it yet, I am just about to actually, but from past Bullet Club matches that has been my complaint.  There is a fine line between interference that enhances the match and interference that hurts the match, and the Bullet Club to me is usually on the wrong side of that line.  Just a personal preference.

[RandomAct]

Bullet Club can have that whole M2K vibe with all the interference, but I think it helped Devitt's character alot at the time.  With AJ, I agree that he probably doesn't need it.  He's a veteran, and a former world champion already.

[Stay Gold]

Wouldn't be surprised if Okada gets it back eventually instead of someone like Shibata or Nakamura getting it. He was super protected in that loss. Not a bad match. I usually never like the Bullet Club shenanigans though. Kinda bummed I won't get to see Okada defend in NYC. Oh well. At the very least NJPW is spicing things up, cause their product has been kinda boring these last 6 or 7 months.

[DougN]

I'm like half-way through and there isn't one match I've really enjoyed. Still got the elimination match, the Gracie tag, and the main event, but this is feeling like a dud show.