BRM Reviews NJPW Best of the Super Juniors XXVI: Day 6

[Big Red Machine]

NJPW Best of the Super Juniors XXVI: Day 6 (5/19/2019)- Yamagata, Japan


YOTA TSUJI, TITAN, & SHO vs. SHOTA UMINO, YUYA UEMURA, & JONATHAN GRESHAM- 4.75/20
Good for the time it got.

DRAGON LEE & TOA HENARE vs. JUICE ROBINSON & TIGER MASK IV- 4.25/10

BULLET CLUB (Jado, Gedo, & Taiji Ishimori) vs. SUZUKI-GUN (Yoshinobu Kanemaru, TAKA Michinoku, & Taichi)- DUD!
You knew someone was jumping the bell here, and it turned out to be Bullet Club. We immediately spilled to the outside for the usual bullsh*t. The referee paced around the ring twiddling this thumbs while the wrestlers choked each other and used weapons on the outside. Eventually we got back into the ring for more choking and so forth. Ishimori was the... um... heel in peril, I guess. More cheating and absurd referee harassment occurred until we came to a finish. This was extremely boring.

VILLAIN ENTERPRISES (Marty Scurll & Brody King) vs. LOS INGOBERNABLES DE JAPON (Shingo Takagi & Tetsuya Naito)- 6.75/10

BLOCK B MATCH: Rocky Romero vs. Ren Narita- 7/10
Another great match for Rocky, who was absolutely vicious here. Narita was an awesome underdog, but New Japan’s own rigid structure kills all of his nearfalls. The fact that these two were able to have a match this good even with that constraint is a testament to both men’s ability.

BLOCK B MATCH: Bandido vs. DOUKI (w/Taichi)- 6/10
DOUKI tried to attack Bandido before the bell but Bandido, not being an idiot like everyone else who turns their back to a member of Suzuki-Gun or Bullet Club, saw it coming and got his boots up to counter. The match was solid, but as a fan I found this quite disappointing. These two guys are new to the company so why not give them time to actually show what they can do?

BLOCK B MATCH: Robbie Eagles vs. El Phantasmo- 6.25/10
Robbie Eagles got upset because El Phantasmo started to bully Kevin Kelly. When Eagles turned around, El Phantasmo pushed him into the ringpost. I’m sure none of this will be relevant in any way after this match is over. The match actually got pretty good for a bit, with El Phantasmo eventually getting a win and El Phantasmo was a douche afterwards as well... but then they just Too Sweeted and made up and nothing will ever come of this, so what was the point of doing it in the first place, as all you have done is hurt the cache of any future time you do this sort of thing?

BLOCK B MATCH: Will Ospreay vs. Yoh- 8.25/10
Yoh worked over Ospreay’s leg. Again... why did they give the Taguchi match the main event and Ospreay the semi-main?

BLOCK B MATCH: Ryusuke Taguchi vs. BUSHI- 4.75/10
BUSHI came out in a ridiculous get-up seemingly inspired by a Native American headdress. I have absolutely no idea why he chose to wear this to the ring tonight. We then started out Best of the Super Juniors main event with... a prolonged comedy spot. And now we’re on the outside without a count-out while BUSHI works over Taguchi’s butt, including with a chairshot right in front of the referee for which he was not disqualified. Now he’s choking him and not getting disqualified. He should see how far he can take this. Maybe ask if anyone in the crowd has a knife he can borrow.
More stuff happened. Taguchi’s butt kept getting worked over. We got a ref bump so that BUSHI could spray Taguchi in the face with the black mist. Why did we need a ref bump for this but not the chairshot? Hell... if anything, it should be the other way around. The mist has always been portrayed as a kind of superpower so theoretically it shouldn’t be ruled any differently from a wrestler spitting normal spit on someone. This just happens to be super-spit. If The Undertaker uses his magical powers to teleport himself out of the way when someone goes to pin him, are you going to DQ him for it?
To get back on track, my point is that if you’re going to do a ref bump for mist and you’re doing a chair spot in the same match, you should be doing a ref bump for the chair spot, too, and I don’t even understand how anyone could put this match together and not see the inconsistency here.
BUSHI’s black mist is so effective that Taguchi won the match a few minutes later. Taguchi is now 3-0 and has main evented all three shows in his block. At this point the only explanation I have for the booking of this tournament is that butt stuff is Taguchi’s gimmick behind the scenes as well, and Gedo has started to partake.


A typical show from B Block: Ospreay’s match was awesome, Rocky’s match was great, most of the new guys weren’t really given time to have anything more than solid matches, and Taguchi and his opponent shat the bed in the main event. The next show is Block A, so at least we know there will be some good stuff there.