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WRESTLE KINGDOM 9 in TOKYO DOME (with Spoilers!)


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I hope AXS' airing of old matches further hooks people into NJPW and they start airing stuff from the Asahi or Samurai shows. WK9 was a great way to create a huge piece of momentum to build on. WK9 is the gateway drug, man.

 

While I was skeptical of Ross' commentary of a promotion he's unfamiliar with (and after listening to some of his commentary on a rewatch, I feel it was justified skepticism), I think if they did another big GFW pay-per-view of the G1 climax final or perhaps the final three shows at a reduced cost, he would be much better off as he'd have the AXS shows to watch and learn from and more time to familiarize himself with all of the wrestlers and their moves.

 

I'm very interested to see what kind of buyrate the GFW presentation did. Too bad about the flip app not working, as I'm sure that soured a lot of people on the whole idea.

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If not future PPVs, at least there is NJPW World so hopefully they build that up with an English version.  

 

I don't think JR is doing anything else with NJPW beyond this event.  In interviews sounds like he's not interested in doing a more regular pro wrestling gig anymore.  But if GFW continues promoting the major events on PPV, maybe they will woo him back.  Seemed like he had a good time on Twitter.

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What an amazing show.

 

Just non-stop awesome, great main events, and I mean.. Makabe/Ishii.. One nearfall made me get out of my seat involuntarily, walk to another room & back, and sit back down. Straight up.

 

Main.. I am a fan of this match-up & this version was done excellently. Tears and goosebumps when Okada left (props to Gedo and his ENTIRE FACE, what a supporting actor during the post-match).

 

ps. And yeah, Matt Striker. Too bad. And him repeating "they're (IWC's) gonna crucify us no matter what" doesn't mean he shouldn't be, fucking smark. Smarking all over THE show.

 

pps. Oh fuck I forgot Honma! One of my very first puro sweethearts in the early 00s, languishing in limbo for years and now this really wonderful pay-off. I didn't even know he'd gotten so mega over now. People gobbled it up. I popped so hard for that finish. I cried a little bit.

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I fondly remember the brick-and-mortar video store near me used to have a UWF tape (miss that store)  Thesz was there and seemed into everything.  I didn't know it was worked and had a ball watching it.

 

So jealous that Thesz worked at your video store.

 

Whoops!  Should have caught that.  You know what I mean!  :)

 

Kevin, I'm definitely falling into that category you described.  I knew about NJPW, but never saw much of it.  I do get the feeling like I'm jumping on a bandwagon and I feel kind of dirty about that.  At least a lot of people are like this right now.  I'm hoping for me the interest is still there later in the year and beyond.  I did get into NJPW World when it came out and I can see myself doing a lot with that.  I literally have no excuse now, especially since I'm paying for it.  I just wish I had AXS TV.

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I didn't hate Striker. He carried Ross when needed. I think it'd help to have a third guy in there though, whether it'd be Pollock or somebody like Barnett. Somebody with more instinctive knowledge.

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I figure Striker was jazzed to do commentary with JR. ISTR he was JR's driver in WWE... just imagine what he could soak up on those road trips.

 

A shame he never did.  From the parts I watched, Striker was just as bad as he was in WWE, except at least in WWE, he wasn't trying to get Jim Ross to yell "LARIATO".  Stop acting like an otaku mark and do your job.

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That's the thing- he was REALLY good when he first got the WWE gig. Even won Meltzer's Best Announcer award that year. At some point after that he flaked and got weird with it.

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Watching Okada V Tanahashi (Thanks MoeCristyV.1.6) and I've got goosebumps before they've even locked up.

THIS is what a main event is supposed to feel like, last time I felt like this watching a WWE main event was probably Dragon/Cena and before that I cant even remember.

EDIT: Great match, on first watch of both I think I prefer Nakamura V Ibushi but the main event isnt too far behind. Not much of a fan of Tanahashi but even with a loss I think Okada still looks good coming out of this.

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Question for those more knowledgeable of NJPW than I am, does Nakamura stay away from Okada, Tanahashi and the IWGP heavyweight scene? Or has he wrestled them before? And if someone could recommend some of his recent matches to watch that would be great. Thanks

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Okada is his stablemate, they wrestled in the finals of last years Glimax. Nakamura feuded with Tanahashi over his IC Belt not too long ago and he said somewhere that he wants to add prestige to HIS title, so he doesn't need the other belt. With Nakamura, check most of his G1 Glimax matches out.

 

And I wouldn't wonder, if Nakamura somehow feuds with Okada (on his way back up to Tanahashi).

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I decided to check out the show in a weird way:  I didn't have much interest in the show initially, but after the way Raw played out, I suddenly felt a desire to give it a watch.

 

Admittedly I'm only a few matches into the show(will watch the rest over the next few days) and I'm not too knowledgeable on the storylines and a lot of the players, but it's been a lot of fun so far.

 

Fujiwara/Kabuki outside the ring after their respective eliminations:  "Kids these days..."

 

Wouldn't have recognized TAKA if it wasn't for the Kaientai logo on his attire.

 

I'm one of the people who likes Striker's commentary.  Almost felt bad for JR trying to keep up with some of the faster-paced bouts.

 

Would have liked to see more of Shelton/Archer/Smith as well as Haste/Nicholls.

 

Forgot how annoying Karen Angle-Jarrett's character is.

 

Randomly got to see Fale at a few STL-area indy shows in late 2012/early 2013 when he was traveling with Kozina.

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I thought JR was great. It took him a few matches to get going and calling junior heavyweights isn't ever going to be his thing but he was so fucking great in the final four matches putting everyone and their story over huge.  Striker got a little annoying at times but it wasn't too bad.

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Question for those more knowledgeable of NJPW than I am, does Nakamura stay away from Okada, Tanahashi and the IWGP heavyweight scene? Or has he wrestled them before? And if someone could recommend some of his recent matches to watch that would be great. Thanks

Nakamura and Tanahashi feuded for many years over who was the ace of the company.  Most of it was before Nakamura became interesting in the slightest, though.

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So, Meltzer loved it...

 

 

Bobby Fish & Kyle O’Reilly retained the IWGP jr. tag team titles over Alex Shelley & Kushida, The Young Bucks and Rocky Romero & Alex Koslov in 13:01 ****

Satoshi Kojima & Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Tomoaki Honma beat Yujiro Takahashi & Jeff Jarrett & Bad Luck Fale in 5:35 **1/4

Toru Yano & Naomichi Marufuji & Mikey Nicholls & Shane Haste beat Takashi Iizuka & Shelton Benjamin & Davey Boy Smith Jr. & Lance Archer in 5:15 **

Minoru Suzuki beat Kazushi Sakuraba in 9:21 ***3/4

Togi Makabe pinned Tomohiro Ishii in 12:23 to win the Never Open weight championship ****½

Kenny Omega pinned Ryusuke Taguchi to win the IWGP jr. heavyweight title in 13:20 ***3/4

Katsuyori Shibata & Hirooki Goto beat Karl Anderson & Doc Gallows in 9:00 to win the IWGP tag team titles ***½

A.J. Styles pinned Tetsuya Naito in 14:25 ****1/4

Shinsuke Nakamura retained the IC title pinning Kota Ibushi in 20:12 *****

Hiroshi Tanahashi pinned Kazuchika Okada in 30:57 to retain the IWGP heavyweight title ****3/4

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Question for those more knowledgeable of NJPW than I am, does Nakamura stay away from Okada, Tanahashi and the IWGP heavyweight scene? Or has he wrestled them before? And if someone could recommend some of his recent matches to watch that would be great. Thanks

Nakamura and Tanahashi feuded for many years over who was the ace of the company.  Most of it was before Nakamura became interesting in the slightest, though.

 

 

And that strange Nocharismasuke Nakamura even gave Tanahashi his only Wrestle Kingdom defeat...would be like Giant Gonzales beat Taker at WM IX!

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Finally getting back to watching more of this.  Dug Makabe-Ishii, just two guys slugging it out and throwing bombs right out of the gate until one of them stayed down.  Makabe threw one of the sickest lariats I'd ever seen near the end.

 

Omega is a totally different person from the last time I saw him...liked JR comparing him to Pillman.

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