All Japan - The House Baba built

[Stopspot]

The big AJPW show in Osaka just ended.

It was a bit of a clunky show that ended on a strong note. It started with some tech issues which meant that the opener had virtually no video and the start of the second match was also lost but they got video back quick enough and it was flawless for the rest of the show.

The undercard was not that amazing to be honest but got the work done. Standard undercard fare. The best match was the Sweeper vs Violence Giant + Billy Ken Kid tag match.

The Bodyguard and Sai had a good match for the Asia title with the big guy coming out on top. Collecting his second ever singles title at the age of 50. Bodyguard has evolved tremendously as a singles worker in just a few years.

Aoyagi and Nomura unseated Akiyama and Nagata for the Asia tag belts as well. This was a fun but clunky match. It was obvious that there was a big experience gap between the two teams and if I were Jun I would have Aoyagi and Nomura stick to defending the belts on smaller shows because I honestly do not think they are ready to produce big show epics regularly.

And in the main event Zeus finally seized the gold and became Triple Crown champion. The match started a bit clunky with a stupidly long crowd brawl but once they went into the second half of it it was an epic. Miyahara is on that Tanahashi bullshit and is easily one of the best aces in wrestling.

The main event was a pretty good metaphor for the entire show in that it started clunky but finished on a high note.

Now we wait and find out who Zeus' first challenger will be. My guess is Ishikawa.

 

[Jay-Ashley]

All Japan has two matches that are my contender for Match of the Year those two being Naoya Nomura v Kento Miyahara at the end of Sumer Explosion and Lee v Kento from the Carnival Finals. Seriously, check out these two matches because you won't be disappointed.

 

[Jay-Ashley]

Honestly, I have to say for me All Japan has been putting on better shows then New Japan as of late. The Champion Carnival was solid this year and the Summer Explosion was great.

 

[Roadster]

Anybody know if AJPW TV has a trial period? I would like to give AJPW a shot, honestly.

 

[Jay-Ashley]

No, they don't

 

[Roadster]

Holy shit man NEXTREME v. Kobayahi & Sekimoto was great. 3.75/5 imo, recommend it.

 

[Roadster]

Well, this was the 2nd All Japan show I watched (both of them in the Excite Series). I saw night 1 and now night 4, and I had a number of preconceived notions about All Japan (mostly from @IndyWrestler telling me All Japan is awful, but he's a New Japan mark so Idk why I bothered with his bad wrestling opinions). Suwama v. Sato was also a really good match, I think.

I will say that All Japan's roster is really unremarkable and is mostly a whose who of mid-2010s Japanese freelancers, and I can't take Yoshitatsu seriously as a top guy, at all, but they really do put on some great matches.

The NEXTREME v. Kobayahi & Sekimoto one being a prime example of 2 teams with nothing in-common, 4 completely different style wrestlers, and them being able to put on a killer match. The vibe, the lack of real star power, the presentation really has its own charm, in a way. It's like watching 2000s ECW, where a bit of the charm is the fact that they didn't have mega names on their roster anymore.

I torrented the shows which is unepic (bite me @EH3?), but I'm excited to watch some more All Japan shows, down the line. I'm certainly curious and do want to see how Suwama and Tatsu work together in their match later this month.

 

[IndyWrestler1]

Well, this was the 2nd All Japan show I watched (both of them in the Excite Series). I saw night 1 and now night 4, and I had a number of preconceived notions about All Japan (mostly from @IndyWrestler telling me All Japan is awful, but he's a New Japan mark so Idk why I bothered with his bad wrestling opinions). Suwama v. Sato was also a really good match, I think.

I will say that All Japan's roster is really unremarkable and is mostly a whose who of mid-2010s Japanese freelancers, and I can't take Yoshitatsu seriously as a top guy, at all, but they really do put on some great matches.

The NEXTREME v. Kobayahi & Sekimoto one being a prime example of 2 teams with nothing in-common, 4 completely different style wrestlers, and them being able to put on a killer match. The vibe, the lack of real star power, the presentation really has its own charm, in a way. It's like watching 2000s ECW, where a bit of the charm is the fact that they didn't have mega names on their roster anymore.

I torrented the shows which is unepic (bite me @EH3?), but I'm excited to watch some more All Japan shows, down the line. I'm certainly curious and do want to see how Suwama and Tatsu work together in their match later this month.

They have been very uninspired during the pandemic. The wrestlers themselves are very good, obviously. Even Yoshitatsu is a very good worker if given the chance. With the great year they had in 2019, 2020 was bad. NOAH and DG are the only Japanese companies that continued having consistently good shows throughout the pandemic bro!

 

[Roadster]

They have been very uninspired during the pandemic. The wrestlers themselves are very good, obviously. Even Yoshitatsu is a very good worker if given the chance. With the great year they had in 2019, 2020 was bad. NOAH and DG are the only Japanese companies that continued having consistently good shows throughout the pandemic bro!

Yeah NOAH has a lot of experience of wrestling in front of virtually no one in small warehouses so it worked out well when the standards fell.