John E. Dynamite

It's an above-average Kawada shitkicking. It's really well-paced. They get to the point quick

New Japan uses the term "Death Match" with just about any gimmick match i.e. any cage match is a "Cage Death Match" - not that I'm against undercard guys walloping them with pieces of lumber, or Triple H making a cameo so he can hit somebody with the handle end of an axe.

This might not make any sense, but I don't have time for single matches. I'm on a FULL SHOW binge. I get in bed, turn on the laptop, dig through MuttonAndTheHam or PuroresuMatches youtube folders and see what's over and hour long: there's a lot of really fun comp tapes, like the annual NJPW Best Bout tapes (nearly-required viewing for NJPW neophytes, which there seem to be more and more of these days) and the must-watch Pancrase The Best two-parter. I'm really impressed by the amount of full Joshi shows available, there's just a daunting amount. There's also loads of good Memphis, but that's for another board. What I'm really interested in tracking down are full shows from FMW (no Tokyopop, Jesus), post-'93 All Japan TV, any and all WAR shows (anything with undercards that regularly insane need the full show treatment), and my guiltiest of guilty pleasures, 1999-2004 NJPW shows. Yes, even the shitty shoot-fight Inokism nearsighted disaster shows. My first puroresu VHS purchases were stuff like the 2001 G1 Climax (Block B is the GOAT of all G1 blocks), 2002's CROSS ROAD show that featured no important (at the time) NJPW-born heavyweights yet still succeeded despite REALITY, and this absolute, undeniable gem of a show. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCxR4WK7jus This, of course, is the 2001 January 4th Tokyo Dome show IN FUCKIN' FULL. Lot of people might have seen the main event, but any one-night tournament final benefits from sequential viewing of said tournament. All the Kensuke matches are ace. So yeah anyways I'm trying to find stuff like that and also the dogshit that came after. Maybe there's some awful Dome Show that happened during a random June where Josh Barnett had a match and there's a shitty HEAT title defense and Ron Waterman tags with Giant Silva. In which case I'm the only possible audience and thus I deserve a link.

To be fair, a lot of us are sofa-cushion black belts who know that he shoulda GOT THAT ANKLE UNDER HIS KNEE. I can't imagine it bothered the live crowd. Is it any worse that Brock's insistence on doing Kimuras from half guard on the bottom?

Props to Lesnar for making Punk look like a zillion billion dollars. This is the first match since the return where Brock's looked like a pro-wrestler and not an MMA guy (with a strange, natural understanding of match psychology).

I don't know, maybe it's also the BURNING EFFIGY or the BLOOD EATING or the ? I know I'm late to the party, but damn. There it is. Is there a better big-match archetype than surly lucha bloodbath? Son of Evil German Doctor vs. Fat Skeleton forever.

Hey, man, that Spider German -> Kneedrop combo is ESTABLISHED. I think the charisma thing is a two-way street - the big issue with the middling years of New Japan was a distinct lack of any crowd heat (Korakuen excluded). But to be fair, watching guys like Toru Yano and Lance Archer connect with the crowd? That whole locker has to have some good vibes going through it.

I liked the match in a purely subjective kind of way. If you want to talk about not selling the leg, damnit Kota you're awful at it. That dandy little fop spends the whole match switching between moonsaults and POWERBOMBS?! (I hate him) and acting like there's a believable way he can compete on Suzuki's level. Suzuki smacks the hell out of him; Kota puts his hands on his hips, makes a face, and engages in a striking exchange - a striking exchange in which Suzuki instantaneously CHUMPS him, stiffs him, chokes him and spikes him.1, 2, 3, go home. Oh, I was marking.

I love the whole P-Funk run, I really do. I even like the late-run Parliament records. But for me, it's always going to be the first three Funkadelic LPs.

Alright. Let's do this. I like to track down and collect lots and lots of deep funk and soul tracks. Big fan of what the Numero label is doing, I dig the hell out of Daptone, but I also like buying regional funk compilations. FROM THE FAIR CITY OF MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA, COMES BAND OF THIEVES with the song "Thieves In The Funkhouse" File this under "How the Hell Has Nobody Sampled This?".

Naito's not back to where he was yet. Word is the match he just had with Nakamura was pretty nice, if it's any consolation to anyone.

PLAY GOLDEN BOY~ My sixty year old ex-music industry dad picked up the recent All Hail West Texas reissue. I don't know how I'm going to convince him Sweden and The Coroner's Gambit are better... maybe, deep down, I know they aren't. But AHWT still has pacing issues! Also, watch the video because they play "Cubs in Five". Do it.

Anybody else finally remake their account to talk about how baller Ishii's big win was? I'm loving Shibata's flavour being added on the nightly, and really digging the majority of the work from the gaijin. On a negative note , consider this tournament the final statement as to why Shelton Benjamin wasn't and shouldn't have been anybody important in WWE.