8 Major Talking Points From NJPW Dominion In Osaka
In which the star rating system becomes a galaxy.
New Japan Pro Wrestling booker Gedo has one thing in common with Vince McMahon, despite his wrestling product existing almost as the antithesis of WWE’s soap opera sports entertainment mode:
The man has balls the size of grapefruits.
January's Wrestle Kingdom XI continued its rich (and borderline depressing, when one ponders it) tradition of presenting a show so absolutely blinding just four days into the calendar year that nothing, it would seem, could approach it. Many consider it one of the best wrestling events ever promoted. Gedo invited comparison to it on Sunday.
Unlike McMahon, Gedo is astute (or willing) enough to recognise and play to his public. The decision to host what was essentially his version of the classic Backlash pay-per-views of yore in Japan’s loudest wrestling city was ingenious. Spectacle was substituted for searing crowd heat; the expectations heightened by the hardcore crowd provided the motivated roster a platform on which to prove that they are the best wrestlers on the planet today.
Such a lofty, histrionic platitude somehow isn’t enough to adequately describe the very best of them. Bettering Wrestle Kingdom XI was thought impossible on January 5.
Come June, Kazuchika Okada et al. proved that impossible is nothing.
8. The Young Bucks Can Rein It In
The Young Bucks are the most polarising act in wrestling. And it’s all by calculated design. Criticism is their sustenance; for every super kick some critics deem excessive, they will throw another one into their matches. Those who decry it as arbitrary are missing the point; they aren’t interested in suspending disbelief but rather mining a postmodern source of heat.
Interestingly, their Dominion match with Roppongi Vice was different fare to their lucrative fallback style. This was a more vicious Matt and Nick Jackson to which we are accustomed.
Rocky Romero was bounced off the ring apron with two power bombs during the initial heat sequence. It was excessive, but then, expecting subtlety from the Bucks is a pointless endeavour. Romero sold the assault with the utmost conviction. It took him several minutes to reenter the fray, at which point he ate another running powerbomb on the ramp.
This was essentially a gloried handicap match that portrayed the Bucks as an actual force, more strategists than spot monkeys, and portrayed Beretta as a dynamic, never-say-die babyface - all while furthering the slow burn Roppongi Vice breakup.
And some critics moan that the Bucks are incapable of telling stories.