NJPW Road To Destruction 2019, 9.5

NJPW Road To Destruction 2019, 9.5NJPW Road To Destruction 2019, 9.5

By GARZA
From September 05, 2019
Discussion

12th Young Lions Cup League Match
Michael Richards vs. Yuya Uemura - 6/10


This was the usual Young Lion stuff. Richards showed some good expressions and fire working out of submissions, and it helped that he had the size advantage with his offense. Last minutes with Uemura surviving the Crab were great. Match was mostly technical and kept to the basics.

12th Young Lions Cup League Match
Karl Fredericks vs. Ren Narita - 7/10


Well, color me surprised, of all the LA Dojo kids, I didn't see Fredericks being the one to take the loss on the first set of dates, but I'm glad it happened against Narita. Just like Connors vs Umino, this was a lot more heated and more of an all out brawl with bigger moves. Towards the end, they both chased Crabs, but after Narita's now signature Belly-to-belly, he finally got it in. Fredericks did a great job using his strength to pull Narita to the ropes, but Narita fought hard and pulled Fredericks to the center of the ring for the submission.

Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Shota Umino & Yota Tsuji vs. Alex Coughlin, Clark Connors & Satoshi Kojima - 6.5/10


Pretty much the same formula as yesterday. Umino mixed it up with both Coughlin and Connors, but by the end of the match, he was all entangled with Coughlin; however, it was the Umino vs Connors exchange that was the best thing of the match. Tsuji was mostly the weak link of the match, taking the pin from Kojima after a lariat.

Post-match - Umino and Coughling brawled.

BULLET CLUB (Chase Owens, Tama Tonga & Tanga Loa) (w/Jado) vs. CHAOS (Tomohiro Ishii & YOSHI-HASHI) & Toa Henare - 6.5/10


This was a lot better with the absence of Jado and the intention of building YOSHI-HASHI as a credible contender. Once again, the tag stuff between GoD and CHAOS was good, and while Chase and Henare don't bring down the match, when they were in there, it did slow it down a bit. Finish saw Ishii pin Chase with a Brainbuster.

Birds Of Prey (Robbie Eagles & Will Ospreay) & Tomoaki Honma vs. BULLET CLUB (El Phantasmo, Taiji Ishimori & Yujiro Takahashi) - 7/10


Same story as yesterday, but with less Henare and more Kokeshis. Honma landed a ton of Kokeshis considering he usually lands one at most in these undercard matches. He did miss a lot of them, so it wasn't like something special either. Honma would end up taking the pin by Yujiro after a Pimp Juice.

I also noticed that Ospreay and Eagles are keeping it safe to the same offense in the last 3 matches I've seem them in, so I think they're probably keeping something bigger for the title match. They're probably keeping the Double Spanish Fly as their finisher tho.

Roppongi 3K, Hiroshi Tanahashi & Ryusuke Taguchi vs. Suzuki-gun (DOUKI, Minoru Suzuki, Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Zack Sabre Jr.) - 7/10


Another match with the same formula as yesterday, this one literally had the same players. Only real difference was that Taguchi was now babyface in peril and it was R3K hitting the 3K on DOUKI for the win now. It was still fun action, but let's see how it progresses for the rest of the tour.

CHAOS (Hirooki Goto, Kazuchika Okada & Rocky Romero) vs. Los Ingobernables de Japon (BUSHI, SANADA & Shingo Takagi) - 7/10


This match now has BUSHI and Romero in it, which is not exactly a detriment, but it did create the same issue as with some of the previous matches, were the two guys doing the filler slow down the match. Yesterday's was one of those matches were any pairing is golden, now I can't really say the same about Romero vs SANADA or Goto vs BUSHI. The match was still good and packed with action. Goto won with the GTR on BUSHI.

Biggest development here I'd say was SANADA locking in Okada in the Paradise Lock, which is just another display of SANADA getting more and more into Okada's head.

BULLET CLUB (Bad Luck Fale & Jay White) (w/Gedo) vs. Los Ingobernables de Japon (EVIL & Tetsuya Naito) - 8/10


So now, in a weird way, what hurt the CHAOS vs LIJ match, also hurt this match. We didn't have BUSHI and Gedo now to keep Fale out of the match, so he had a lot more action, which don't get me wrong, it wasn't bad, him and EVIL can pull off a good tackle exchange, but it took out yesterday's explosiveness.

The good thing here was that with the absence of the juniors, Naito and White were forced to do more stuff together and now it wasn't about White dodging Naito, now he was actively countering Naito's offense, which is White's biggest strength. This also allowed Naito and EVIL display a lot of tandem work, which is always a treat.

The match came down to a ref bump, Gedo interference, and chairs at one point. It was kinda obvious that it would build to EVIL's signature chair spot on Fale and a following Destino for the LIJ win. Ending felt chaotic, but the action was good.

OVERALL THOUGHTS


Yesterday I said that this tour looked really solid, and I'm already eating my words, this was considerably weaker than yesterday. A combination of the same teams going at it and some matches just being weaker was the reason. Young Lion stuff was still great.

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