G1 Nights 5 and 6
KENTA vs Lance Archer: Should have been a triumphant return to Korakuen for Kenta, instead the crowd was more into Archer. Kind of surprising but kind of not since Archer constantly plays to the crowd and there aren't many American style big men working in Japan in 2019. Pretty solid match, the most logical story of KENTA chopping Archer down with kicks and winning with the LeBell Lock, which to my knowledge is the first time he's done it since leaving NOAH in 2014.
Evil vs Sanada: Liked that they didn't fuck around with partners not wanting to go at it and just immediately went to war. Sanada was finally opening up and showing some personality in his last block match, but that was missing from this match and in general it felt very choreographed. Maybe planned out is a better term. It didn't feel natural, which is something I find pretty common to both guys and was an issue I had in their previous G1 match.
Zack Sabre Jr. vs Hiroshi Tanahashi: I'm very pleased to see Tanahashi moving so much better than he was earlier in the year. He looked awful from after WK until...I guess the Dallas show. I really thought the Ace's time was up, but the Ace is forever. GO ACE. Tana isn't known for being a particularly great technical guy, so seeing him play along with ZSJ's wacky cocaine octopus bullshit was pretty fun.
Kota Ibushi vs Will Ospreay: Man, I don't know what the fuck is wrong with these guys. Ibushi has what would appear to be a 3rd degree ankle sprain and of course isn't taking any time off, and not only not taking time off but doing a "hey just throw me on the guard rail as recklessly as you can ankle first it will be cool". I myself suffered an ankle injury that isn't fully healed I think 2 months on now and will still make me feel like I broke my foot off if I tweak it wrong. He's just going to have everyone twist and stomp on it for another 3 weeks. And Ospreay....he's always hurt, never takes time off, has been working with a neck issue for 2 years at the age of 26, clipped his head on the apron doing a space flying tiger drop in Dallas and fucked his neck up further, almost got pulled from the match (and to get pulled for an injury in Japan means you're really fucked)....has Ibushi drop him on his head at least 5 times. Oh, and that crazy elbow Ospreay does that legit concussed the fuck out of Ibushi at Wrestle Kingdom? They did it again and it was even harder, except it was to the front of the head instead of back this time. These guys are going to be so fucked when they get older.
Juice Robinson vs Jeff Cobb: Surprisingly hot, mostly because of Juice being really over, especially with women. Unlike the Cobb/Ishii match, this didn't go 10 minutes longer than it needed to so Cobb wasn't completely gassed by the end. It's hard to care too much seeing how Juice has been booked repeatedly to get a bunch of momentum and seem like he's going to break out only to get put on ice for a year for no reason. English commentary keeps pointing out his new attitude and focus but I can't see it going anywhere beyond another US Championship or NEVER Championship match/reign. Honestly I'm not sure Cobb ever even gets to that point. I just don't think NJ sees much in him, and tbh I don't either after his weight gain that has severely hampered his cardio. He's the only ROH guy booked in this and they had the AEW (which they not only don't have a relationship with but have a mandate to not mention on commentary) guy run through him.
Tetsuya Naito vs Hirooki Goto: Man, Gedo has broken me because I no longer give a shit about Naito at all and I'm actually pretty close to the point of just not watching his matches anymore. Gedo has made it clear he either doesn't think Naito is a top guy, thinks it doesn't matter how he books him because he's so popular regardless, or thinks he can really stretch this story out another 2-3 years. Whichever option is closest to the truth, it's made Naito matches and stories impossible to get invested in because they never matter. And Goto...well fuck, he's been getting raw dawged for 7 years now. No one remembers because it was before NJPW's popularity really picked up again, but before Okada came back from excursion and got the rocket push, Goto was the heir apparent. Instead he's been a dork who loses every big match for almost a decade now. And every time he has an angle where they're like, "No really, this time he's serious, this is do or die", he dies. The last time he went full Hakushi, still got smashed by Okada, joined Okada's stable after, and has Okada smashing him in his own entrance video
So what I'm saying is, it doesn't matter how good this match was or wasn't, I can't give a shit about what either guy is doing, which is a sad state and testament to NJ's booking at times being as shitty as WWE's.
Jon Moxley vs Tomohiro Ishii:
Dean's NJ run has made me realize he was mentally checked out for YEARS in WWE. I'd say he might have checked out as early as 3-4 months into his solo run post Shield break up. That's the last time I remember him putting effort into making his kicks and elbows and dives connect. This perhaps wasn't a 5 star affair, but it was a lot of fun with brawling around the building, lots of slug fest spots, ISHII doing a diving splash to the floor through a table, and general violence. Moxley has been booked super strong in NJ and it's kind of weird because he's not planning on working NJ during his off time once AEW TV starts, so I wonder where his run/title reign is going. Any loses a champion has during the G1 leads to an automatic title shot, and at this point he's undefeated with Naito being the only guy I can see getting a win over him at this point.
