Alrighty, whenever there’s a New Japan event, it’s hard to anticipate much better wrestling going on. With that, there were 3 NJPW events this week, so it’s expected to see some of them crack the Top 5 Matches Of The Week.

Before we move forward, we need to touch on the January match of the month and last week’s winner. For January, it was a two horse race, but Andrade ‘Cien’ Almas vs Johnny Gargano @ NXT Takeover, is the first match to make it into the Match of the Year pool. Now with last week, it was very close between two matches also, and it went in a way I didn’t expect. Winning by literally 1 vote, Sasha Banks vs Asuka @ Raw, edged out Roderick Strong and Tyler Bate.

So let’s get to a Japanese wrestler dominated Top 5, and I don’t mean all New Japan either…see…foreshadowing:

5. Raw: Asuka vs Bayley

Going from confusingly competitive matches with Emma, to jobber squashing, now to two of the best women’s matches in a long time. Asuka doubters won’t have much else to complain about, aside from her being undefeated and not fluent in English.

Now this match wasn’t quite as good as her match last week, but it did a multitude of things. It showcases that the main event women aren’t too far behind Asuka’s level. It reminded us that Bayley, though a terrible character, is still a more than half decent wrestler.

However, I think part of what made this match worse than Sasha’s is just because it involved Bayley. She doesn’t really have an aggressive streak, she’s not as believable at doing whatever it takes to win, and the fact she’s not over, hurts viewer involvement when the crowd doesn’t care either.

Still not a bad match at all, and proves the Raw women’s division is in good shape.

Rating: *** 3/4 (Gold I)

4. Pro Wrestling NOAH Navigation for the Future: Noamichi Marufuji vs Kaito Kiyomiya

The classic story of Senpai vs Kohai…erhm…master vs student for non Japanese enthusiasts.

After Kiyomiya unsuccessfully challenged Kenoh for the GHC Heavyweight Title upon his return from excursion, he wanted to prove himself. Marufuji is a living legend in Japan, and one of the wrestlers Kiyomiya looked up to when he was a young wrestler in NOAH. So it made sense for Kiyomiya to try his hand at Marufuji to see how he stacked up.

Kaito showed a lot of determination during the match, but you could tell Naomichi was teaching him a lesson as the match played out. The young returning wrestler got in a few good licks and the match lasted over 15 minutes, but Marufuji proves why his name carries so much weight in Japan. He puts the kid away with the Shiranui (Sliced Bread) and the subsequent pinfall.

Rating: *** 3/4 (Gold I)

3. 205 Live: Hideo Itami vs Roderick Strong

Aside from not liking who went over, this match was impressive for both guys.

Throughout the match, the announce team put them both over as favorites in this tournament and referenced their history with one another. Also funny point, Strong would’ve gained the ire of Mr. Demarco by referring to Hideo as Kenta during his trash talk in the match. But that aside, this match was an NXT match on 205 Live.

Stiff strikes from both men, backbreakers from different angles, and Itami pulled out a few more tricks from his bag. Whenever a match wakes up the tired crowd, you know there’s something about it. Strong also managed to crawl his way out of the Rings of Saturn, nailing an End of Heartache, to signify the end of the match.

So Strong moves on for the Cruiserweight Championships, as well as, being the number 1 contender for the UK Championship. Are they looking to maybe unify these belts through Strong? Who knows, that was purely random speculation since that’s the first thing I thought.

Rating: **** (Platinum V)

Honorable Mentions:

NJPW: Tetsuya Naito vs Yoshi-Hashi
Rating: *** 3/4 (Gold I)

NJPW: Kazuchika Okada & Hirooki Goto vs Sanada & Evil
Rating: *** 1/2 (Gold II)

NJPW: Hirooki Goto vs EVIL
Rating: *** 1/2 (Gold III)

Raw: Roman Reigns vs Bray Wyatt
Rating: *** (Gold V)

ROH: Mandy Leon vs Madison Rayne
Rating: ** 1/2 (Silver III)

2. IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Title Match: Will Ospreay vs Hiromu Takahashi

The opening video package…holy hell, watch it, it’s hilarious. It has a cat narrate that Hiromu has the mind of a cat but Ospreay has the agility of a cat (hence the cat picture lead in).

As for the match, I mean, Hiromu is amazing and Ospreay adds a lot of sizzle to his matches. Neither wrestler kept an edge for very long and Hiromu tried to focus on Ospreay’s neck. A bunch of big and flashy moves, though the match wasn’t without a few odd spots and a little repetition towards the end. Still though, not a fan of that Beheading move, looks really corny.

Rating: **** 1/2 (Platinum III)

1. IWGP Heavyweight Championship Match: Kazuchika Okada vs SANADA

Sanada maintained his usual persona for the early goings of the match, cold, seemingly disinterested and his usual too cool for school body language. It was as soon as Okada started kicking Sanada in the head mockingly, the crowd booed him loudly. The crowd was pro LIJ all night, but at that point Okada turned the crowd, and Sanada capitalized with a nice sequence ending in a dive to the outside that made the whole building erupt in cheers.

The expressions on Cold Skull were starting to show surprise and desperation when he found 2 innovative ways to apply the Skull End. First out of an Asai Moonsault from the corner, and then he basically did a Destino, but instead of a DDT, stopped at the end for the Dragon Sleeper and dropped down into Skull End. Even with how impressive Sanada looked, he was doomed as soon as the desperation took him over.

He cut the Skull End short and went for a Moonsault, in which he jammed his knee and got a 2 count. With no other idea what to do, he tried another moonsault, which Okada countered. This lead to the ending sequence where Sanada countered at least 3 Rainmaker attempts before he got caught by the Jumping Tombstone and then a Rainmaker finally connects for the pinfall victory. Also gives Chaos the 3-2 victory in the faction war.

Tremendous match, anyone who was unaware of Sanada’s potential…this was his coming out party.

Rating: ***** (Diamond V)

So, you see what I mean about Japanese wrestlers? There was at least one in all of the Top 5, so, there we go. When it comes down to that whole decision making aspect of the end of the article, it should be obvious. Kazuchika Okada vs Sanada had some of the best in ring work of anything so far this year. That match it a MOTY contender in my heart even if it doesn’t make the cut this week.

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