Opinion
Top 5 Matches: Week Ending 6/3/2018
Well we had our final match vote for the May pool, and this is a little surprising. Winning by a decent margin was, Jeff Hardy vs Daniel Bryan @ SmackDown. So that makes May a very WWE heavy vote, let’s see what we got.
May Pool:
WWE Backlash Intercontinental Championship Match: Seth Rollins (c) vs The Miz
205 Live: Buddy Murphy vs Mustafa Ali
NJPW BOSJ 25: Will Ospreay vs Taiji Ishimori
SmackDown: Jeff Hardy vs Daniel Bryan
Out of this pool, it should be a fairly obvious winner, so I’ll pile on. Seth Rollins vs The Miz @ Backlash, is my vote for May.
So let’s get to the current week, and first matches for June.
5. ROH TV Title Match: Austin Aries vs Silas Young (c)
Silas Young tosses his shirt at Aries, he catches the shirt, says no one wants it and tosses on the outside and starts playing around early. Some nice mat wrestling with headlock take downs and counters out of it, before the pause for the audience to clap spot.
The early portion of this match has a lot of counter wrestling and sweat throwing. Aries lifts up Young by his chest hair, runs him pillar to post a few times on the apron. Ear Claps him to the floor and goes for a dive, but Young counters that with a big right hand.
Silas has a most of the control on the outside, rolls Aries back in and follows up with a Slingshot Foot Stomp. Then there’s a few big strike exchanges before Silas gets a near fall after his Back breaker/Lariat combination. Young holds Aries in a Full Nelson for a while until Aries runs him around and gets enough momentum to dump him out of the ring. Aries then starts picking up some steam after a neck breaker and his Bottom Rope Suicide Dive.
Then we get a kind of redundant spot of Young going for Misery and Aries countering, then immediately trying his Brainbuster about three times. Finally Aries counters Misery by sliding over the top rope, bringing Silas onto the apron and hitting a big Death Valley Driver on the apron.
Silas catches Aries during a dropkick attempt, hits a forward roll Samoan Drop followed by a springboard moonsault but Aries gets a foot on the rope. Young then goes to use the TV belt, the ref stops him and Aries locks in the Last Chancery, but Silas gets to the ropes.
Ref bump during Misery, Aries hits a few of his signature moves. Beer City Bruiser comes down to interfere, Kenny King evens the odds. Silas goes to use the belt, Kenny King stops him and hits him with the belt for Aries to pick up the pinfall.
Aries is assumed to be the new champion until Todd Sinclair comes down and they pull the Dusty Finish. So the senior ref reverses the decision and DQs Aries.
Winner: Silas Young via DQ
Rating: *** 3/4
4. NJPW BOSJ 25: Taiji Ishimori vs YOH
After feigning the handshake, the match starts off fast. A few strikes while running the ropes, Ishimori rolls to the outside to compose himself, but YOH hits a gorgeous Tope con Hilo. YOH continues to lay in the boots on the outside, rolls in Taiji and goes for three pin attempts in a row. YOH stays on Ishimori and lands some strikes in the corner. When he tries to whip Taiji across, Ishimori rotates through the ropes to the apron and does his bob and weave through the ropes spot, taking down YOH with a springboard Thesz Press.
Will Ospreay comes out at this point to watch the match since he needs Taiji to lose, to win A Block. It doesn’t seem to rattle Taiji too much, there’s a few words exchanged, but he keeps the advantage until he missed a Double Knee Strike in the corner. YOH manages to sequence a Dragon Screw into a Hip Attack, Enzuigiri, Double Foot Stomp to the back and then a Back breaker/Neck breaker combination for a near fall.
Taiji counters some momentum and puts together a nice Flying Headscissors, to send YOH to the outside, where he follows up with a Golden Triangle Moonsault. Ishimori slides YOH back in at 17 and pins him for a 2 count. After taking a second to think, Ishimori hits a Cartwheel Death Valley Driver into a Shining Wizard for another 2. First attempt for the Crossface from Ishimori but YOH gets to the ropes.
A Dropkick sends YOH out, to do his Rewind Thrust Kick, but Taiji moves out of the way and hits a Lethal Injection. He goes for the pin and on the two count, YOH does the matrix out of the cover and Thrust Kicks Ishimori in the side of the head. After a spot where they’re both down for a while, they get up, start jawing at each other and we get a strikefest. Taiji gets the advantage and starts raining the forearms down while YOH is in the ropes so the referee makes him back off.
It looks like Ishimori starts settig up an Avalanche Frankensteiner, but YOH manages to fight against him and almost get a Powerbomb off. Taiji fights through, YOH steps away and hits a big Enzuigiri. Then YOH pulls off his Seth Rollins impression to do a Superplex into a Falcon Arrow for two. YOH goes for a big Reverse DDT maneuver, but Taiji stops that, hits a Bicycle Knee Strike and manages to pull off his Bloody Cross, for another near fall.
Taiji goes for another, but then we get a very nice roll up sequence for YOH. Cradles, La Magistrals, O’Connor Roll with a bridge, and the crowd erupts for the near falls. Taiji manages to take advantage of the bridge as he kicks out, locking in the Crossface. Will Ospreay is going insane on the outside, urging YOH to fight through it…but to no avail. YOH taps out, and Taiji Ishimori wins A Block.
Winner: Ishimori via Crossface
Rating: ****
3. NOAH Navigation with Breeze GHC Heavyweight Championship: Takashi Sugiura (c) vs Naomichi Marufuji
The match starts out how you would expect from two veteran rivals. A lot of feeling out, a few mind games during rope breaks, and then the aggression picks up. Marufuji hits Sugiura with three sets of Kawada Kicks before getting caught by Sugiura and thrown off the apron via Gutwrench Suplex.
From that point, Takashi keeps momentum for a while. A nice Body Scissors submission to weaken Marufuji, followed up by a few power moves, including just throwing him into the top rope and watching him bounce back into the ring. After getting worked over in one corner, Sugiura shoots him into the other, and Naomichi finally finds some offense. A big kick, followed up by a Dropkick, creates a little space for Marufuji to recollect himself.
Marufuji now strings some strikes together, lands a big running kick in the corner and it looks like Sugiura is going to counter the next move, but Naomichi moves out of the way, and Takashi goes shoulder first into the ring post. This opens up a nice opportunity for Marufuji to land his signature strike combination. He tries to continue the advantage but Sugiura counters his suplex attempt with a throw into the corner.
A running big boot and a knee strike later, Takashi has the momentum back. He takes Marufuji to the top corner and hits a big Vertical Suplex that he delayed long enough for the crowd to start clapping in support and anticipation. Takashi sinks in a deep Boston Crab after the big top rope move, but Marufuji manages to hop his way to the ropes off his knuckles.
Another moment of trading strikes and go behind transitions ends up in Marufuji following Sugiura to the ropes, and hitting a beautiful Dropkick. Marufuji then hits his Apron Piledriver and allows the referee to start counting while he tries to recuperate. Sugiura manages to crawl back in at 18, Marufuji tries to hit his Springboard Curb Stomp, but Takashi moves and hits a big Release German suplex, sending Marufuji neck first into the corner.
Sugiura is getting blatantly frustrated as he rains down forearms and pushes the referee away when admonished to stop. Marufuji almost gets the advantage back, but Takashi counters a Standing Body Scissors into a German Suplex Hold for a near fall. A big running knee, and another near fall for Takashi. Sugiura attempts an Olympic Slam, Marufuji slips out, Takashi charges, but Marufuji moves and hits a big Ko-Oh in the corner. He manages to hit a big Shiranui on Sugiura after that, but an exhausted cover leaves Takashi’s leg available to just fall on the bottom rope before the three count.
A big Spanish Fly from Marufuji gets two, so he goes for his Fisherman’s Flowsion, but Sugiura counters it into a Brainbuster. We get the Strong Style strike exchange from these two worn out warriors. It was even for a short while and then turned into Sugiura just rocking Marufuji, all while Marufuji goads him to hit him more. A big Ko-Oh from Marufuji, followed by a Lariat from Takashi, lays both men out.
Marufuji gets a quick spark where he hits a bunch of strikes, two reverse Crescent Kicks and a wrist clutch knee to the head for only two. Naomichi then goes for the Fisherman’s Flowsion one more time, but Sugiura counters it into the Olympic Slam and then hits his Front Necklock submission, where Marufuji eventually taps.
Winner: Sugiura via Front Necklock
Rating: **** 1/2
Honorable Mentions:
NJPW BOSJ 25: SHO vs Marty Scurll
Rating: *** 1/2
NOAH Navigation with Breeze GHC Heavyweight Tag Match: Go Shiozaki & Kaito Kiyomiya (c) vs Katsuhiko Nakajima & Masa Kitamiya
Rating: *** 1/2
OWE: Cima vs T-Hawk
Rating: *** 1/4
Impact Under Pressure Heavyweight Championship Match: Austin Aries vs Pentagon Jr (c)
Rating: *** 1/4
SmackDown: The Bar & Miz vs The New Day
Rating: *** 1/4
MLW Fusion: Rich Swann vs Kotto Brazil
Rating: ***
OWE: Wang Jin & Monk Zhao Yilong vs Whirlwind Gentlemen
Rating: ***
NJPW BOSJ 25: Will Ospreay vs Flip Gordon
Rating: ***
Impact Under Pressure Knockout’s Championship Match: Allie (c) vs Su Yung
Rating: ***
2. 205 Live Cruiserweight Title Match: Cedric Alexander (c) vs Buddy Murphy
Early chess game with some chain wrestling and flipping out of initial high flying moves. Wrecking Ball dropkick and Suicide Dive send Buddy Murphy over the announce table for the early advantage. Murphy manages to find an opening when Cedric plays to the crowd and trips him up on the table and drops him onto the apron, followed by throwing him into the barricade.
Murphy continues to hit stiff kicks and knees into Alexander’s back. A lot of back and forth counters through this match. No one keeps momentum for very long and that does help to increase the suspense. After a huge Tope con Hilo by Murphy, he missed a Double Foot Stomp and Alexander hits a big Michinoku Driver for only 2.
The back of Alexander flares up to delay his offense, and Murphy hits a big running Vertical Suplex for another 2 count. They go to the apron to tease a big Suplex from Murphy, but Alexander counters and hits an apron Flatliner of his own. Both men slide in at 9, with Murphy countering the first Neuralyzer into a Stormbreaker style DDT, very cool looking even if the set up was a little sloppy.
We see a big strike exchange that ends in Murphy catching Cedric’s foot and hitting a big running bicycle knee, for a near fall. Cedric counters a Murphy’s Law into a small package, catches Cedric’s foot for a big Power Bomb near fall and Murphy hits a Kamigoye Knee strike, but to no avail.
After a little trash talk, Murphy throws Cedric into the ropes and gets caught with a desperation Neuralyzer. Realizing he has an opening, he hits another and finally finishes the match with a Lumbar Check.
Winner: Cedric Alexander via Lumbar Check
Rating: **** 3/4
1. Dragon Gate King of Gate Semi-Finals: YAMATO vs Naruki Doi
Early feeling out process from two former winners. A few should blocks and strikes as Doi goes for a quick crucifix pin for about 1 and a half. Feeling out continues when YAMATO brings it to the ground and tries to apply an Armbar, but Doi fights through it masterfully.
First big spot of the match is a seesaw Brainbuster attempt that YAMATO gets the best of and immediately floats over for a Crossface. Doi goes to the ropes to break the submission. YAMATO breaks the hold then walks over to Doi, now on the apron, as Doi trips up YAMATO and hits a smooth Slingshot Elbow Drop.
YAMATO is on the back foot for a while after that move. He rolls out to try and recollect himself but Doi jumps on him once he comes back in. A few attempts at offense from YAMATO get stifled, and Doi ends up getting YAMATO on the mat and sinking in a nice grounded headlock. Even after the rope break, Doi continues his offense assault as he ties YAMATO up in the ropes, hits a big running missile dropkick followed by a top rope Elbow Drop for 2.
Finally YAMATO gets something going, a small strike exchange and a big drop kick, put Doi on his heels for the first time in a while. Doi tries to break out of an Arm Ringer, but YAMATO grabs him and hits a quick Belly to Belly Suplex for the near fall.
A lot of counter wrestling follows between the two. Doi eventually hits a High Angle Backdrop as both men look exhausted. Strong style strike moment ensues, Doi kicks YAMATO’s leg out from under him to hit a big Snap DDT. Doi attempts his Bakatare Sliding Kick, but YAMATO moves out of the way and counters with a Crossface.
The momentum continues for YAMATO after a few big corner moves and a big dropkick for a near fall. Doi hits a big Avalanche Leg Trap Fisherman’s Buster for another 2 count. The desperation moments kick in so we know we’re getting close to the end. Tombstone Driver from YAMATO, kick out, Doi hits Noshigami and his Bakatare Sliding Kick…for a near fall. Multiple attempts at Gallaria and YAMATO finally hits it for 2, after a little more fight from Doi, YAMATO manages to hit Ragnarok, for the pinfall victory.
YAMATO will now face Masato Yoshino in the King of Gate Finals.
Winner: YAMATO via Ragnarok
Rating: *****
So much like Eric Ames and Christopher Platt guessed, on the Top of the Morning Podcast, I found a slightly better Japanese match for number 1. So even though, I’m expecting Murphy vs Alexander to be the shoe in, I’m voting for, YAMATO vs Naruki Doi. A rather disappointing tournament, put the two favorites against each other in the Semi-Finals and they showed up. King of Gate 2018 is still mostly a waste of time, but this match alone is at least worth watching.
Always Use Your Head and make your opinions known in regard to the Top 5.
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Opinion
TheChairshot.com PRESENTS: WWE Bash In Berlin Immediate Reactions
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Opinion
AJ’s Top 3 Favorite SummerSlams
AJ is back with his annual opinion article, and this time the SummerSlam buzz got him wondering about his personal Top 3.
It’s been a while since I have done any form of writing and SummerSlam is this Saturday. Of all the SummerSlams I’ve seen over the years; which ones are my favorites? While it’s not a revolutionary idea, I figured everyone loves to debate favorites of well, anything. Don’t worry though because this isn’t just going to be pure recency bias. I’ve watched the majority of them so with the ones I put on the list, it hit me more in some way shape or form whether it was story, a really good match or it just felt like a solid event.
At least this proves WWE is trending in a good direction for me, when it gets the ol’ brain juices flowing just because a show is around the corner!
#3: 2022 (Ol’ Brock Lesnar Has A Farm)
Starting off the show, we get Bianca looking for a rematch against Becky from last years SummerSlam and it was better than the 21 second affair that everyone claims was a squash. This time Bianca holds her own and beats the Man in a fairly decent match, good way to get the event started. Next up is the heat seeking missile, Logan Paul against the former heat seeking missile because, well he wasn’t cut out for it and wasn’t a guy in everyone’s eyes, The Miz. After they had their blow off at Mania with Logan coming out on top which… isn’t awful, I just don’t like Logan Paul because he has that dude bro aura and swagger to make him more hateable than any other person on the card. Which I suppose is his gimmick…so…kudos?
First Championship match is for the US Championship and it’s as expected that in Theory, he should never beat someone to the caliber of Bobby Lashley which is no surprise. Dominik and Rey still back when Dom wanted the good fight against the Judgement Day before joining them later. The former Colts players, which they hammered it dahn in this match up showed that the canal swimming, trash talkin’, podcastin’, current RAW Color Commentatin’ goofball we all love, Pat McAfee came out on top again Bum Ass Corbin.
Usos putting the Street Profits on lockdown in the penitentiary since I believe this was peak Bloodline with the belt collecting and running all of WWE. Liv beat Ronda Rousey which isn’t astonishing but it’s not something people had on their bingo cards for anything with WWE so it was a nice little shock factor. The most memorable part of the night is obviously the Main Event, Lesnar brings the tractor, Roman catching the Microphone and Brock stands on top of the vehicle. Damn good match that showed off what they do in the ring since Roman caught his stride as the main bad guy and Brock… liked people after all of this? That is still a weird statement in my head. Brock being a good guy people person. If Liv wasn’t on bingo cards for wrestling, that is not on bingo cards in any aspect of life really.
That is more of the event that had solid matches and story going for it. No weird double count out, multiple people involved, 5 tag matches on the card. Things made sense and weren’t convoluted, had shocking moments that were great to see like Liv actually getting a title defense and there were the results we all expected at the time like Theory losing in 4 minutes to Bobby Lashley.
#2: 2009 (Are You Ready for The Return?)
This event wasn’t that strong. It was strong with the star power involved in 2009 with guys like Rey Mysterio as Intercontinental Champion, Orton and Cena for the WWE Championship as it was becoming as stale as month old chips and CM Punk was facing Jeff Hardy before he ultimately returned to TNA at the beginning of 2010 after this PPV. For me, it’s not so much of the show itself, it was more of the memories because the Balai as our friends Chris Platt and Rey Cash like to call my brother and I, we were just coming back into wrestling and we were TNA Fans. We didn’t watch WWE that much really, it was just what came on after another channel had old ROH shows before they moved to three hours and swallowed the 8pm Eastern Slot. No, the reason why this has so many memories for me is three main reasons. First, Orton and Cena. They have had their rivalry since the beginning it seems, being each others foils like Hogan and Piper before them and there had to be a stipulation where if Randy was Counted Out or DQ’d, he’d lose the championship regardless. This was prime Viper Randy and the obvious joke we had of Super Cena where he very rarely lost, unless it was SummerSlam surprisingly enough.
Number two reason was CM Punk and Jeff Hardy. Hardys known for the Ladder and TLC matches in the past and this being the penultimate match for this feud and it was a banger of a match. If you didn’t know Punk before, it was a great introduction to his wrestling. I used to like Punk a lot because of this match because he could talk, wrestle… and not insanely personal with things in wrestling. In all seriousness, this was a great match. Ultimate risks, high reward for Punk grabbing the World Heavyweight Championship and he was given his next feud because of the final boss of SmackDown at that time. Thanks, Teddy Long.
The main and final reason though why this match gave me the memories flowing back is more of the fact that one of my closest and longest termed friends of 23 years, also loves wrestling. Back when we were younger, he’d do MoCap videos on YouTube with his figures. We’d have friends come over for parties at his house and we’d do the one thing WWE always told us not to do and that was try it at home. He was always stronger than me, I was always more charismatic. He had the power aspect and did things with brute force, I could talk my way out of trouble with parents if we did something wrong. There was always one thing that our respective mother’s always called us though… it’s on the tip of my tongue… oh right, ‘Degenerates’.
As soon as we were called that, we kind of parodied the DX line. I was limber enough to do the HBK pose and do a Superkick before it became the new DDT and he would just Spinebuster people and knew how to do the water spit. So what do you think was the main reason we even ordered this PPV for his 13th Birthday? I think the two guys we were pretending to be were set to return on a tank and toss out some glow sticks. The return of DX, Shawn Michaels coming back after Mania with Triple H to deal with the Legacy problem was an amazing return for them and made everything so much fun.
So we have the solid card and this one has a personal story… what’s my number one SummerSlam? Is it personal? Well yes but not going into that. Is it a good card? To me, it was a phenomenal card! Is it memorable? Seeing how wrestling fans still mention at least three matches to this day.
#1: 2005 (Octopus in the Washer, Lover’s Quarrel and Where the F%#$ is Vickie?)
Quite possibly some of the best matches I’ve seen and one that was just the most hilarious moments of overselling in wrestling history, I know why I love this SummerSlam but it’s also a really good card at the same time. Redacted beats Orlando Jordan in 25 seconds for the US Title and they made jokes about it like, he can make a coffee faster than he beat Orlando and stuff like that, it’s pretty funny. Angle getting sick of Eugene’s antics for his Gold Medal was also a great bit they had play up, the Year long feud of Randy Orton and Undertaker was still going on where Orton comes out on top this time around to get the win back from Mania, Jericho returning for the match with Cena in a whole promotional thing for each other’s groups, Fozzy for Jericho and the Chain Gang doing Bad, Bad Man for Cena leading up to a match for the WWE Championship. JBL won a 20 man battle royal on SmackDown to win the Championship…… Opportunity to face the newest member of SmackDown, Batista but the three main matches that a lot of people talk about to this day; Edge vs Matt Hardy, Rey vs Eddie for Dominik and Hogan vs HBK in the Main Event.
I have reasons to enjoy the Hardy/Edge match but it looked like a real fight, it really made us believe that Matt Hardy was going to kill Edge because real names were dropped during this tirade from Hardy. It wasn’t Edge and Lita, it was Adam and Amy. Matt was so dead set on beating the hell out of Edge that they made a situation into gold and it was a great moment for this match to happen, I believe it was also an Unsanctioned Match too which added the intensity until matt got concussed and knocked senseless that it looked like he couldn’t fight for anything but the build up was what made it seem like a marque match. It made it feel real, it made it feel awesome and it made it feel personal.
Eddie kept tormenting Rey Mysterio about Dominik not being Rey’s but Eddie’s for the summer. That’s all you heard from Eddie being the weasel he was is hanging out with Dominik, making the world believe it’s his son and what not (Let’s not do a fast forward to today where he has the mullet, mustache and everything like Eddie) but they settle this in a Ladder Match where the top of it is a document for the custody of Dominik and my god, this match is better than it should have been. I expect nothing else from Eddie because the man hated having a bad match, Dom got involved and stopped Eddie, Vickie was late and stopped Eddie. The whole match was good it was just very weird with the premise but was a great match. I wonder if Rey regrets his decision to win the match now…
Octopus in a Washing Machine… those five words have resonated with Shawn Michaels’ performance in this match, forever. It was supposed to be an amazing match up between Hogan and Michaels, Icon vs Icon it said and suddenly Hogan’s back gives out, can’t do a trilogy of matches so we can only do the one and then pull out of everything after. This match was set up to be a classic and instead turned into the most unbelievable sell fest ever. A Hogan big boot caused Shawn to tumble 3 or 4 times, getting crotched on the ropes had HBK bouncing higher than he should have, being tossed out of the ring made it look like Shawn never broke his back in 1998 from how much he flopped and flipped around like crazy. It’s bad… or maybe even good that a lot of current wrestlers watched this match that went, “I can sell like that, I want to be a wrestler” and did. So good or bad, I don’t know but for some reason this PPV has always had a place in my heart for how memorable it was.
Those are my top three SummerSlams so far but who knows, 2024 has potential to maybe bump something or at least get me to consider a shift. Should be fun to see how the show plays out! What are some of your favorite SummerSlams?
About Chairshot Radio Network
Launched in 2017, the Chairshot Radio Network presents you with the best in sports, entertainment, and sports entertainment. Wrestling and wrestling crossover podcasts + the most interesting content + the most engaging hosts = the most entertaining podcasts you’ll find!
MONDAY - Bandwagon Nerds (entertainment & popular culture)
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Attitude Of Aggression Podcast & The Big Five Project (chronologically exploring WWE's PPV/PLE history)
TheChairshot.com PRESENTS...IMMEDIATE POST WWE PLE REACTIONS w/ DJ(Mindless), Tunney(DWI) & Friends
Patrick O'Dowd's 5X5
Classic POD is WAR
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