IWGP Intercontinental Title Match:
Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Bad Luck Fale
IWGP Tag Team Title Match:
Karl Anderson & Doc Gallows vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi & Togi Makabe
IWGP Jr Heavyweight Title Match:
Kota Ibushi vs Winner of 2014 BOSJ
NWA World Tag Team Title Match:
Satoshi Kojima & Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs Davey Boy Smith Jr. & Lace Archer
Special Tag Match:
Tomohiro Ishii & Kazuchika Okada vs. Yujiro Takahashi & AJ Styles
Ishii pins Styles gets his shot. Calling it now.
DO IT.
have him win too
I've yet to be bored by an Ishii match. Dude fucking brings the thunder.
Ishii is the best professional wrestler on the planet right now; I'm having a hard time even calling a second place.
NJPW “DOMINION 6.21″, 6/21/14 (WPW/iPPV)
Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium
1. IWGP Jr. Tag Team Title: Matt Jackson & Nick Jackson (c) vs. KUSHIDA & Alex Shelley
2. Tetsuya Naito vs. Tama Tonga
3. Yuji Nagata & Tomoaki Honma vs. Hirooki Goto & Katsuyori Shibata
4. NWA World Tag Team Title: Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima (c) vs. Lance Archer & Davey Boy Smith Jr.
5. IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title: Kota Ibushi (c) vs. Ricochet
6. Special Tag Match: Toru Yano & Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Minoru Suzuki & Takashi Iizuka
7. Special Tag Match: Kazuchika Okada & Tomohiro Ishii vs. AJ Styles & Yujiro Takahashi
8. IWGP Tag Team Title: Karl Anderson & Doc Gallows (c) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi & Togi Makabe
9. IWGP Intercontinental Title: Shinsuke Nakamura (c) vs. Bad Luck Fale
Don't we have to wait for Takahshi to get his shot at the NEVER title, though? I've completely forgotten all about that.
Probably yeah but they do occasionally plant seeds and then go another way, like the whole 'loser of the NJ Cup faces the other belt holder' fake-out.Originally Posted by DDT
As much as I'd love to see Ishii pin Styles I think we're looking at belt domination by Bullet Club. I think Shelley was meant to win BoSJ, turn, and beat Ibushi.
By the way, welcome to the forums, Gibby!
So is everyone in agreement predicting a Bad Luck Fale win here?
My predictions across the card
- Fale d. Nakamura via shenanigans
- Anderson & Gallows d. Tanahashi & Makabe via shenanigans
- Styles & Yujiro d. Okada & Ishii via shenanigans
- Yano & Sakuraba d. Suzuki & Iizuka cleanly after attempted shenanigans
- Ibushi d. Ricochet
- KES d. Tenkoji
- Nagata & Honma d. Goto & Shibata after some kind of miscommunication between the losers
- Tonga d. Naito via shenanigans
- Young Bucks d. Time Splitters after Shelley turn
I hope I'm wrong because Bullet Club kind of get on my nerves.
Fale beat Shinsuke. Shinsuke beats AJ. Okada beats Fale. Double Title Match in the Dome.
TAKE MY MONEY
Well if you really want me to.
as long as the second step in the sequence comes sooner than later
Sounds about right to me.
Ricochet is so winning the Jr Title by the way
I have been saying that since he dropped the DG belt just before entering the BOSJ. The coincidence was too big.
He also got over pretty fucking well.
Because the Japanese fucking love Ricochet why does no one listen to me.
Here's what I know. New Japan wants a Gaijin Babyface Jr Heavyweight to replace Devitt. Kota Ibushi who they brought in to be Jr Heavyweight Ace is bitching about being burnt out. Dragon Gate contracts come due after Kobe World. Ricochet just won the Super Jrs. I'm adding 2 and 2 when I say he is so winning.
Ricochet is so joining Bullet Club...
Looking forward to this now. I ran through my most cynical projections earlier in the thread, but here's what I'd like to see or would do if Gedo & Jado called me up for advice (it COULD happen).
- Nakamura d. Fale clean, or even vanquishing attempted interference. I get the utility of the Bullet Club take every belt angle, but the foreign fans have bought the bone shirt now - it's not too over in Japan and it feels really forced and not going anywhere significant. I realise Nakamura beat Fale once this year but that's because he's far far better.
- Tanahashi & Makabe d. Bullet Club for the IWGP Tags. See above really. Won't be terrible if Gallows/Gun keep hold though.
- Ishii/Okada d. Styles/Yujiro - Ishii pins Styles with Ishii Driller. This is far-fetched but the whole Yujiro thing would have been a good tease to abandon and we can go into Ishii v Styles for IWGP at Kizuna Road with Styles going over and Okada v Yujiro as punishment for ditching CHAOS.
- Don't have a favoured outcome for YTR/Sakuraba v Suzuki/Benjamin. Just try for a good match?
- I'm really torn on what to do with the IWGP Jr Heavy. Fantasy world says Ricochet wins and Ibushi 'goes heavyweight'. He is too much of a star and has a great arsenal of non-flippy stuff to keep down in the junior leagues, where Ricochet is wed to flip-world and would create a new series of matches.
- KES to beat Tenkoji and ship KES off to the US for the G1 duration.
- Naito to beat Tonga. Again, we can't keep jobbing out one of the best in-rings in wrestling because the smarks don't like his look. Tonga is not that great and even with interference his win would really hurt things.
- No desired outcome for Honma/Nagata v Goto/Shibata, it's easy to point to Honma as pin candidate but as long as they work an angle in then I'm fine with that. Nagata is weighing the NJPW cards down whilst on the GHC because they're way too respectful to have him ever take a fall.
- Bucks d. Splitters. I like the Young Bucks and think that KUSHIDA needs a singles run.
Pretty excited for tonight. It's not the hottest overall card but Ibushi/Ricochet is the biggest juniors match in years and year, the Ishii tag should be good and hopefully elevate him and I'm looking forward to some Honma/Shibata exchanges in that tag.
You watching live, Gibby? The Rajah NJPW live watching crew needs to start consisting of more than me and Defrost.
100% watching live as always, girlfriend is out of the country, work is largely done, 7.30am wake for self-physio, 8.20am shower and dress, 8.40am breakfast, 9am large pot of coffee and watch screaming men wallop each other as hard as they possibly can. Does it get any better than that?
Oh fine; I'll try and watch it live; what ungodly hour Sunday morning do I have to be up?
You gotta be up SATURDAY morning. Tonight/tomorrow, 4am.
Well shit buckets.
Awesome opener
YES. fun stuff though in young bucks fashion it got too kickouty at the end.
Does Naito have grease on his boots? Slip sliding everywhere.
poor naito
Naito needs to do something to get interesting
well uh. that ending was odd. really good match though. when is honma's iwgp title reign.
Here we go
Didn't expect that
G1 is stacked
G1 YES.
No Honma is disappointing, same with no Sakuraba. Still looks great.
I don't get those match announcements though. Were they only announcing certain matches or are the cards just gonna be short?
Yano teaching Saku how to cheat is a brilliant gimmick
dozed off during that tag. i'll stay up to watch the ishii tag but we'll see if i can make it through the tag titles and nakamura/fale.
NICE CALL DEFROST
Eh can't win em all. Or really any of them this morning it seems.
eh
ehhhh
At work, who got results?
Thoughts to follow.
Um. Wow. Did not expect the title changes we got. Surprised Ricochet didn't win his match. Wtf, NJPW?
Thoughts, contains spoilers.
Absolutely loved the opener. People complain too much about the Bucks and their so-called spotfests. They're as close as you get to a lock for a good match these days, and given the lower importance on tag wrestling, I think that's even more of an achievement. This encounter dialled back on the out-and-out crazy a little and went for a great match with really intelligent pacing. Loved the central stretch of Shelley getting beaten down, looking for the tag repeatedly and failing, then eventually finding a clear route to KUSHIDA...who's been taken out of action. They cranked it up so well that it didn't feel like a match before a hot finish, but a continuous mechanism moving toward an organic finish (inasmuch as one is possible). Splitters win, but who's next? I guess for a month or two it doesn't matter.
Naito nearly came a cropper with his pre-match pose, tumbling off the turnbuckle. Couldn't quite do the sensational carry job as he did with Fale but got the job done as an opening heavyweight singles bout. The placement of this match was key, in my opinion, for recalibrating anticipation that the night would be a gigantic Bullet Club jerk-off. Two defeats for BC, no interference attempted.
Really enjoyed the fierceness of Goto/Shibata v Nagata/Honma. They look like they could really put on a decent singles series starting with the G1 block and I'd be well up for that. Honma carried the rest of the enthusiasm, with his finisher attempt getting its own chant. Goto picked up the pin but looked a little lost out there to be quite frank as all storyline momentum swung toward a singles match, as Shibata/Nagata brawled to the back.
TenKoji and KES was better than expected, with Archer impressing and all four showing low mobility but high interactivity. At one point all bets were off as to who would win and for me, that is a sign of a good title match.
Ibushi and Ricochet was really good and whilst some will say it ended too soon and didn't quite peak, I say that it looked every inch a teaser for an even bigger match down the line, with Ibushi needing to preserve ahead of the G1. Never seen Ibushi's finisher before, and with every match I grow to look past Ricochet's flaws (he did a G2S as a standard move) and see his phenomenal talent. Qualms over the result? None from me, but I'm sure there are some. Ricochet is still a Dragon Gate guy after all.
Yano/Sak v Iizuka/Suzuki wasn't a dud, with some really fluid exchanges between Sak & Suzuki and a couple of nice spots with YTR. Iizuka cannot work anymore and should probably think about taking his ham act out on the road because, and this is no diss, it would probably be more at home in smaller venues in front of kids. The feud, it seems, continues...
Didn't get my fantasy result in the Ishii/Okada v Styles/Yujiro match but we did get a crisp go home show type match where the challenger gets to look good in front of the champ. That said I thought Yujiro was out of his league with these three and I hate so much of his offence - his running boot looks really soft, for instance. What annoys me even more is that he's clearly very strong and when he hits suplexes and throws he starts to look very much an upper midcarder. Didn't get enough Ishii v Styles for my liking, but a good match.
The tag title match went a little long but maybe that's because I don't particularly like Gallows or Anderson as a combo. Makabe seemed to get legitimately bust in the mouth very early and uncharacteristically dropped like a sack of shit during a strike exchange with Gallows. I'm actually not upset the champs retained purely because I like it when tag teams are a bit more gelled and legitimate and as yet Ace To King seem like two singles guys together (in that interview that Yottsume translated, they indicated that they never really hung out despite working in the same company for 13 years). Good match on the whole.
Nakamura is a goddamn wrestling genius. Last Sunday, admittedly on an indy show, Fale failed to impress in a short singles match whereas many came away in raptures about Nakamura's performance. Here, Fale shone and Nakamura absolutely carried him to another good outing, preferrable to their NJC match (which was average until the blood). Fale debuted a couple of new things that were impressive, such as a genuinely rough (in the good sense) looking splash from the top. Less High Fly Flow and more High Fat Fale Fall. When Nakamura wriggled out of the first Bad Luck Fall attempt I had an inkling that Fale would eventually go over, and so it proved.
A fine card that never really hit the super heights but delivered across the board. Most of the matches were meaningful and there was no 'let's cram 8 juniors in a tag match' nonsense. No Bullet Club interference either, leading me to think there has been some kind of edict issued. Am dying to see Tanaka & Komatsu do more than just hold ropes open and escort people to the ring: NJPW needs a bit more youth coming through.
Kizuna Road, presumably featuring Ishii v Yujiro, and then G1, which has its own thread. The crowd reaction to the blocks was FANTASTIC.
Because Dragon Gate was REALLY going to let Ricochet go after all this work to get exposure for him...
I have to point out that wasn't the G2S; it was the Go To Sleepy Hollow, a signature maneuver of CHIKARA regular Hallowicked. Hallowicked uses it as either a finisher or set-up to his other finisher (Flying Yakuza Kick) whereas Ricochet uses it as a standard move because he's a fucking idiot. Otherwise spot-on agreeing with you on that match; a good, better-than-expected match that will no doubt annoy the shit out of me in the coming days due to the long lines to give it the most sumptuous blow-job.
Also, after than finishing run I feel much better about the Yujiro vs. Ishii NEVER title match than I did before this tag, where I feared we'd get our first Ishii dud.
Last edited by DDT; June 23rd, 2014 at 5:25 PM.
Did not know and happy to be corrected.
This show was enjoyable, I liked it. Riccochet kind of annoys me.. Some crazy high flying though, that dive over the corner turnbuckles looked pretty damn dangerous. And wtf was that thing Ibushi won with? Never seen anything like that. Looked like some violent form of kamasutra.
Phoenix Plex (Bridging Package Fallaway Powerbomb). Never seen it before myself.
Ibushi has done that move off the top rope before
Overwrought and overlong review: http://fujiwaraarmbar.blogspot.co.uk...inion-621.html
Eh young bucks vs time splinters is the best match I've seen this year by fucking miles. Why isn't everyone wanking over it yet? Shelley is up there with the most underrated performers on the planet.
Young Bucks might be my tag team of the year. Time splitters are brillz too and, yeah, there's a reason Shelley fucked off outta TNA to go somewhere he would be appreciated.
The bucks are brilliant at playing the dickhead heel. Cocky, chicken shit but aggressive and incredible team work. Brilliant to watch. Them vs the usos would be pretty sexy.
If the Bucks didn't look like a generic inbred version of The Naturals and the Hardy Boyz 1998 I'd like them cosmetically. Physically their offense doesn't look like they could hurt a 10 year old, but it is impressive.
Eh it's wrestling you mong
I fully agree with Mike.
I think that is why they work better as heels. Kneejerk is probably to look at them and think Rockers or Hardys but because of what you say it is easier to push it to want them beaten up.
I don't like the Young Bucks' double team offense at all. Usos smoke them for best tag team of 2014.
I combo Defrosts and Nash Diesel's opinions: they look like Hardy Boy/Rocker clones and their offense looks so contrived its irritating, but they're supposed to be a pair of Nancy boys you want to see get clobbered, where after irritating you for a time they get clobbered. So basically their shtick works.
Absolutely love the Bucks, no two ways about it, a lock for a good match and they get legit heat, they also elevate tag wrestling as an underappeciated form of the sport.
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