Jump to content
DVDVR Message Board

NJPW G1 Climax 30.


The Natural

Recommended Posts

3 minutes ago, EVA said:

Just wanted to pop in and say how much I loved Ishii getting to win the A Block final night main event.  He has been the G1 MVP for like 5 years running, but given his age and standing in the company, I feel like this was about as close as he’ll ever get to making the finals or winning.  Great moment for him.

I do hope Tomohiro Ishii and Minoru Suzuki win the IWGP Heavyweight Championship. That should happen. You're right that Ishii's been the G1 Climax MVP since 2013, I'd say.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 minutes ago, Curt McGirt said:

So I missed everything after I dug into my DVR overflow ? Ah well. What should I go back and watch?

Missed everything, yeah? Top of my head:

Ishii/Suzuki.

Naito/Sabre Jr.

Okada/Shingo.

Okada/Ishii.

Naito/Tanahashi.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Really enjoyed SANADA-Ibushi but I could see why some will gripe. I don't think I'll ever get a good nearfall as NO ONE HAS EVER KICKED OUT OF KOM BA GU YEI! So I was satisfied. 

The under card was fun, sets up Power Struggle and the BOTSJ and the tag tournament nicely. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Might not have been the best match of the tournament (although it was pretty damned great) but the Ibushi-Taichi match was to me the most memorable. The only other match I can recall like it was Samoa Joe's ROH debut in 2002 vs Low Ki where Ki was in bad shape and couldn't do his high flying stuff so they just kicked the living hell out of each other instead.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, doctorhbomb said:

 

Question: anyone know what Tanahashi was saying to KENTA after their tag match? He seemed to be teasing him about his briefcase . . . or maybe something more was happening.

 

Kenta was telling Tanahashi that he owed him a new briefcase, since it was Tanahashi's skull that dented it. I am not kidding.

@Curt McGirtoff the top of my head I think you might enjoy Cobb vs MiSu and Cobb vs Okada in addition to the matches that Natural recommended. 

 

  • Like 2
  • Thanks 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

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.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

So much for watching live on chat, parental obligations got in the way. A satisfying enough finish to a great tournament which was a welcome distraction to dive into for the past few weeks. Final was at a pretty methodical pace but I was getting really sucked in by the near-falls by the end. Out of the two I'm happy the winner won but wouldn't have minded a fresh face or fresh circumstance (like Naito winning and calling his shot). I'll give Mister O Khan a minute before shitting on him like Wato but Ospreay's group does feel pretty low-rent British indy for the moment.

The 3-man English booth did a solid job building up the hype with Chris Charlton giving the context and Kevin Kelly weaving together the story threads. I'm sure I remember Rocky being better than this before but he seemed mostly off and had a tone to his voice like he was barely able to take the whole thing seriously. 

And it seems Shingo is being slotted seamlessly into the Ishii role of bruiser workhorse who gives great performances night-in night-out but won't ever be the top dog. 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

With EVIL positioned to be the top guy in BC now and Ospreay newly minted as a gaijin heavyweight heel, it definitley feels like they’re clearing the runway for a Jay face turn.  That, or preparing for Jay’s possible departure.  Don’t know what his contract status is, but you have to think he’ll be highly sought after by WWE and AEW whenever it’s up.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I intended to watch what I could of G1 but life got in the way.  The only stuff we watched were the Yano matches as we just needed some comedy to cheer us up.  And I will say that Yano is a goddamn treasure.  The matches had a similar vibe to it yet were also quite different.  So even watching his last G1 match it was hard to get tired of what he was doing.

But from what I got from this topic it seems that this year might not have as many epic matches as past years.  Would that be a fair assessment or were they actually on par with past years.  I would think the change in crowd interaction would hurt that.  But I'll seek out the matches mentioned above when I get a chance.

Edited by NikoBaltimore
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The lack of cheering hurt a lot of matches. I think given the circumstances they did the best they could. Guys like KENTA and Jay White trying to stall outside the ring or Okada's cobra clutch hold really liked some major matches. The shows themselves were much better paced due to the shorter cards.

Hopefully the BOTSJ and World Tag League do the same thing. It felt feasible to actually watch the majority of the tournament.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

One of the great near falls ever. 

Ibushi winning is such a nice surprise. He really was an afterthought in this tournament but now these next few months look like the culmination of a very long journey for him.  

So, this is going to sound worse than I mean it, but Ibushi winning this and getting the main event against Naito after this summer of Evil mucking up the main event scene and the Sanada tease is like how the WWE spends the year pushing whichever dorks in main events but when Mania comes they go back to Lesnar because he's actually a star.

Ibushi is a star. Evil and Sanada aren't. 

On another note - I said it before and I'll say it again, Ishii is 100 percent a WON Hall of Famer. So is Ibushi. 

 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

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.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

That Jay White promo was basically a babyface promo. No Gedo, and he basically said he's going to prove to everybdy he's the best by winning gold again - and very gently implied he was going to do it without shenanigans, not necessarily for the right reasons but it's not like Naito is really a nice guy or anything is it?

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Having finally watched Ibushi/Sanada, I felt it was OK. I liked that it was sort of slow paced feeling out and mat and chain wrestling for the first 10 minutes, and they didn't even start attempting pinfalls until about 15-16 minutes.

However, after that, it felt like the match never really got out of second gear. Finish was good, and I'm fine with Ibushi winning provided he takes the title at the next Dome show. It was fine to start that way for the first half, but I never really felt like it truly picked up in the second.

My favorite part of the post-match stuff was Ibushi giving Jay White the death stare and tossing him a Zima. They even toast at the press conference. That was cool. Also, the fact that they were drinking f'n Zimas. ZIMA!

 

Edited by TheVileOne
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 hours ago, sevendaughters said:

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.

I wanted to discuss something related to this earlier, but only got round to mentioning a lack of apron spots during the G1 this year.

I feel like the overall intensity/danger quotient has really been scaled back since New Japan returned to action - it looks really intentional to me. I seem to recall reading somewhere that a lot of people attributed the escalation in high-risk stuff in NJPW to Kenny Omega - he started adding more, the rest of the roster followed suit to keep up (I don't know if it rests 100% with him, but it seemed to coincide with his rise in the company). Now that he and the Bucks are gone, it seems like a readjustment to the NJPW "house style" is happening. 

Take Tetsuya Naito: not long ago, he was quoted in an interview as saying he'd rather go three more years at 100% than stretch his career out another ten years only going at 60-70%. Whether it was his eye injury or the pandemic (with accompanying added weight of being the guy to carry NJPW through it), I thought he wrestled a much more conservative tournament than he has in years during this G1. More holds, more mat work, a more gradual build-up to the match. Yet to my eyes, this was the most consistent he's been since 2017, without needing to resort to anything too risky. I believe he demonstrated (both to us and hopefully for his own sake, himself) that he's got enough in his toolbox that he can put on enjoyable wrestling matches without endangering himself too greatly.

I think this applies to almost everyone I watched - you've still got that Ishii/Shingo/Suzuki/Goto tier of guys who are still going to smack the hell out of each other, but a lot of the more dangerous spots and bumps seemed to fade in to the background this year. I think this de-escalation accounts for some of the disappointment. 

Edited by Teflon Turtle
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...