Mochi the God, Flamita/Tozawa and Susumu's Little School of Wrestling

Dragon Gate 2015/3/6

T-Hawk & Flamita vs. Masaaki Mochizuki & Dragon Kid

Mochi was godlike here. T-Hawk was playing some badass games by insisting on strike exchanges with him, but man, he got obliterated on multiple occasions. Mochi is a seasoned veteran who can still pull a trick or two out of his sleeve and hit you from the most unusual positions. Jesus, some of those blasts were Battlartsesque. Flamita was great as well, he brought the modern lucha with him and his high flying stunts made for helluva visuals. Impressive. Flamita/Mochi must happen ASAP.

***3/4

Dragon Gate 2015/4/9

Open the Twin Gate Championship: Jimmy Susumu & Jimmy Kagetora vs. Masato Yoshino & Shachihoko BOY ©

Well, this came out of nowhere. Sure, I love Susumu and Kagetora, but S-BOY is someone I only remember being an average jobber and not much else, while Yoshino is such a hit or miss wrestler, it’s amazing really. At least 60% of the match was a build, persistent and patient build to the climax, and shit man, it was great. They took their time and made sure everything was organic and coherent, they created few really interesting subplots and the climax was red hot in front of traditionally awesome Korakuen fans. BOY was a huge underdog fan favorite and he sure as hell worked his ass of here. But the real MVP of the match was Susumu, just like in every match he’s a part of. The match also contains easily the best and most dramatic save in a very long time. Highly recommended modern tag classic, millions of thumbs up for this one.

****1/2

Dragon Gate 2015/3/24

Open the Brave Gate Championship: Flamita vs. Akira Tozawa ©

Two major problems with this match: 1) Flamita totally no-sold the legwork, and 2) Tozawa’s incredibly lame character that I find insanely boring. Lukewarm contest saved by an amazing finishing struggle.

**3/4

Goodbye, Uhaa

Dragon Gate 2015/2/28

Open the Brave Gate Championship: Akira Tozawa vs. Kzy ©

Good shit, Kzy worked over Tozawas’ arm in the beginning and it was a nice subplot for the first half, the climax was dramatic with fine struggle to survive and few very exciting nearfalls, all in all I enjoyed the match even with Tozawa playing a godawful character.

***1/2

Dragon Gate 2015/2/28

Open the Triangle Gate: Mad Blankey (Naruki Doi, Cyber Kong, CIMA) vs. Dia.HEARTS (Masaaki Mochizuki, Dragon Kid, Big R Shimizu) ©

Oh man, I gave up on this 8-9 minutes into the match, life IS short after all, garbage wrestling 101.

didn’t finish

Dragon Gate 2015/3/1

Open the Dream Gate Championship: Uhaa Nation vs. BxB Hulk ©

Well, fuck me sideways, this was so amazing, reminded me a lot on Uhaa/Ricochet from the last year, truly incredible title match. Uhaa should open a school of selling after this marvelous performance, my god he sold that leg perfectly, Hulk went after it early in the match as an answer to Hulk’s nasty powerhouse moves and it turned into a major plot point that eventually slowed Uhaa down during key sequences in the closing stretch, the legwork paid off big time for Hulk. Uhaa’s selling was really amazing and elevated the match to great heights, but Hulk deserves tons of credit as well, especially considering this match came after his horrendous performance in the Susumu title match where he flat out refused to sell any leg damage, here it was the opposite, he was constantly attacking Uhaa’s leg and was relentless in doing so, very Tanahashiesque I’d say. Not only that, he also sold his back very well after Uhaa’s brief work over it at the beginning.

So yeah, all things considered the match was basically flawless, and everything clicked and was executed perfectly. This was Uhaa’s last match for Dragon Gate and he went out in such a style, with the ageless performance, now he’s the owner of two arguably the greatest matches in company history.

*****

Random January Puroresu

Wrestle-1 2015/1/11

KAI vs. Masakatsu Funaki

I always love when these two meet, they have a great chemistry where nifty simplicity runs wild and this match was no different. Funaki is such a class wrestler who always makes his opponents look good and KAI is in the position where he really needs that nowadays. Their “shoot” and “pro” styles mesh well and the finish was excellent. Hopefully one of them win the championship so we can see them in a big title match, preferably in Sumo Hall, that’d be swell.

***3/4

Wrestle-1 2015/1/11

Wrestle-1 Tag Championship: Yasufumi Nakanoue & Yusuke Kodama vs. Team 246 (Kaz Hayashi & Shuji Kondo) ©

This was an excellent wrestling story, the young underdog challengers wasted no time and decided to go full throttle right off the bat, they estimated their chances would be bigger if they cut an opening phase or two from the beginning and go straight to rapid fire moves. Well, they didn’t win but they came pretty damn close, probably closer than where they’d come under Hayashi & Kondo pacing watch. The crowd was very into the match and some of the nearfalls were glorious. I totally didn’t expect the match to be this great, these four guys killed it, Nakanoue looked amazing.

****1/4

Wrestle-1 2015/1/24

TAJIRI vs. Daiki Inaba

TAJIRI, an absolute master of the game, takes the talented youngster to school. He gives him a lot and makes him look amazing, TAJIRI is the best of the best. You don’t want to miss this mini-classic. Might be the best Wrestle-1 match ever.

****1/4

Dragon Gate 2015/1/18

Open the Triangle Gate: Monster Express (Akira Tozawa, Shingo Takagi, Shachihoko BOY) vs. Dia.HEARTS (Masaaki Mochizuki, Dragon Kid, Big R Shimizu) ©

Mostly dull as shit, with only Mochi and Shimizu being the saving graces, but not enough to elevate the match properly. I hated Tozawa here, he was awful. There was so much dead parts, and of course they didn’t want to call it a day until all the Dragon Gate trio ingredients were squeezed in. Yack…

**

Dragon Gate 2015/1/12

Akira Tozawa & Shingo Takagi vs. Masaaki Mochizuki & Big R Shimizu

Good match, Shimizu was the best here, dude’s the best thing in Dragon Gate now. On the other hand, when did Tozawa get so lame and annoying? Smh…

***