Cero Reviews NJPW Best of the Super Jr. 24 Day 1

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cero2k
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Cero Reviews NJPW Best of the Super Jr. 24 Day 1

Post by cero2k » May 18th, '17, 11:15

NJPW Best of the Super Jr. 24 Day 1
May 17, 2017
Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan

Intro video - Made reference that this is Liger's last BOSJ tournament, that Ospreay is current defending BOSJ, Takahashi is the Junior Heavyweight champ, and KUSHIDA trying to get back to the top.

BOSJ24 Group A
Taka Michinoku (0) vs Jyushin 'Thunder' Liger (0) - 6.5/10
Good opener between two veterans of the ring, you can't have a better way to start this show than with Liger. Match was mostly controlled by Liger, working Taka's legs, who in returned was working more towards the crossface, which looked more like a choke. Action was good, some great heat when Taka would lock in a submission on Liger, and some good near falls towards the end. Only bad thing I saw was an unnecessary chair shot from Liger, right in front of the ref. Finish was surprising, but being the first night, everything is a go tonight. Taka offered an ovation to Liger at the end of the match.

BOSJ24 Group B
Volador Jr (0) vs Tiger Mask IV (0) - 7/10
I fucking love Tiger's entrance song. Volador Jr is probably the one that I'm most interested in from Block B, and nothing against Tiger, but I feel this may be Volador's worst match of the tournament. Having said that, it was a pretty good match. Tiger worked the arm/shoulder, which Volador did a great job selling. Volador's offense on the other hand made honor to his name and was for the most part all aerial attacks once his left arm was rendered useless. This really came down to Tiger Mask's experience working against Volador (who's not really a rookie himself), where Tiger was anticipating many of Volador's moves and would catch him with a counter, but even after a Tiger Driver, Piledriver, and other top moves, Tiger couldn't put Volador down. Finish looked painful, but great nonetheless.

BOSJ24 Block A
Taichi w/Miho Abe (0) vs "King" Ricochet (0) - 6/10
This is the tournament where we really see what Taichi can bring to the table in 2017, especially in group A. Miho tried to seduce Ricochet before the match, Ricochet completely no sold her, maybe Tessa is watching from the rafters. Taichi for a long part of the match was just avoiding Ricochet from outside the ring, at one point Ricochet went for the tope suicida, but eventually Taichi got away too. Taichi used Miho to distract Ricochet and attack him from behind with the mic stand and finally started getting some heat on Ricochet. Later Miho distracted the ref while Taichi attacked Ricochet with some sort of cross/hammer/thing. Eventually Ricochet was able to make a comeback and do all that stuff that makes Rip Roger's blood boil. The match did get a lot better once Taichi stopped cheating and started wrestling, but at that point, it felt like half of the time was wasted in Taichi fleeing around.

BOSJ24 Block B
BUSHI (0) vs ACH (0) - 7/10
TheJapanese pronunciation of ACH is the greatest thing ever. So either ACH doesn't pay attention to LIJ, or he is completely naive to think that BUSHI would play fair during a handshake. There was a really sick springboard jump from ACH to BUSHI where I think BUSHI's neck may have come off a bit, you just hear the thud and see BUSHI go down, in return BUSHI then hit a DDT that probably compressed ACH's vertebrae down. Love the wrestling in this match, but I also really disliked ACH trying to be funny in order to get the upper hand. Great finish sequence.

Hirooki Goto is on commentary tonight.

BOSJ24 Block B
Desperado (0) vs KUSHIDA (0) - 7/10
As KUSHIDA made his entrance, Desperado got in his face and attacked him starting the match, this small advantage gave Desperado the upper hand through most of the first half of the match, where he worked KUSHIDA's leg. KUSHIDA managed to make a comeback and slowly start working Desperado's arm towards the armbar. This match should had been great, KUSHIDA and Desperado were by themselves good, but there was a terrible ref bump, spots where the camera angle didn't help, and a lack luster finish. Desperado just pinned the ROH TV Champion.

BOSJ24 Block A
"The Villain" Marty Scurll (0) vs "Quicksilver" Will Ospreay (0) - 8/10
Great ovation for Scurll in his debut, people were really intrigued to see him. Ospreay with new haircut and going by Quicksilver, he's really over with tonight's crowd, but you're still hearing "Ua Ua" "2Sweet" chants for Marty. They're playing out knowing each other a lot and trying to one up each other in their own ways. Ospreay was bumping like crazy for Scurll, at one point he unnecessarily exaggerated a sell and dropped his own self on his head just to sell the shoulder/neck injury, which Scurll focused on the rest of the match working building the Chickenwing. We saw a lot of back and forward in this match, each guy definitely got their stuff in, Ospreay even getting his Rainmaker pose thing and a Shibata spot. This wasn't their best match i've seen with them, but it was also shorter than usual, this was a good debut for Marty to show his stuff.

BOSJ24 Block B
Yoshinobu Kanemaru (0) w/Taka Michinoku vs Ryusuke Taguchi (0) - 7/10
This is an interesting pairing, you have the comedy wrestler going against arguably the most serious man in the tournament. Match started with Taguchi doing his comedy shtick, which ended up working against him and Kanemaru got the upper hand working Taguchi's head and....butt. Taguchi made his comeback going with big moves and....butt, he worked Kanemaru's leg towards the end. Finish saw Taka Michinoku distract the ref which led to both men low blowing each other, but among the chaos Tacuchi was able to roll up Kanemaru for the win. Taguchi is still doing the YEAOH Nakamura taunt.

Dragon Lee (0) vs Himoru Takahashi (0) - 9/10
I don't think this was their best match, something was off with both of them I felt, which was actually making spots look a lot more painful, but having said that, this was yet another awesome battle between these two that are up there with Okada/Tanahashi in terms of chemistry together, two guys that were born in different sides of the world and somehow found each other. This guys were going 100 mph from the start, it's hard to list everything they did, there was a great good german suplex exchange, each one of them looking sick. They threw each other against every corner, top rope spots, powerslams to the floor. At one point it felt like they were virtually just hitting each other with the same moves. Worth nothing that Dragon Lee didn't just pin the champ, but this is Takahashi's first loss since returning to Japan.

Post-match - Dragon Lee cuts a promo saying he really wants to learn Japanese because of NJPW, he's happy to be here and he's here to show why he earned his spot in the tournament and he's here to earn the love of the fans by the end. Great babyface promo.

OVERALL THOUGHTS
Good start to the tournament, we already got two of the most expected matches out of the way, but you have to believe there are tons of matches coming that will definitely make these show look weak in comparison. Tomorrow we get Ospreay vs Ricochet, I hope Vader is holding on to something, this is gonna get flippy....Dive.
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Big Red Machine
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Re: Cero Reviews NJPW Best of the Super Jr. 24 Day 1

Post by Big Red Machine » May 18th, '17, 11:27

cero2k wrote:Intro video - Made reference that this is Liger's last BOSJ tournament,

So what are the odds that they've learned from last year's Tenzan storyline disaster?
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

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Re: Cero Reviews NJPW Best of the Super Jr. 24 Day 1

Post by cero2k » May 18th, '17, 11:29

Big Red Machine wrote:
cero2k wrote:Intro video - Made reference that this is Liger's last BOSJ tournament,

So what are the odds that they've learned from last year's Tenzan storyline disaster?

hopefully did they. at least Liger winning the whole thing isn't that far-fetched like Tenzan going to the finals. Liger is definitely my guy to win it
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