10 Awesome Wrestling Matches From 2017 (That You've Already Forgotten About)
1. Kazuchika Okada Vs. Minoru Suzuki - NJPW The New Beginning In Sapporo
This masterpiece of selling and traditional wrestling isn't likely to top any year end lists because, even though the selling was next-level, the structure and content of the match, on the whole, was almost anachronistic.
Suzuki had annihilated Okada's right knee in a pre-match press conference angle. He doubled down on the damage in the match itself, smashing it to bits with a steel chair and gruesome guardrail-assisted submissions. His job seemingly done, he relinquished his attack dog grip and beamed, like a kid at Christmas, as he looked on at the damage.
Okada then spent virtually the entire remainder of the match - a good 35 minutes - selling the damage with a wince-inducing authenticity. It was if he was setting himself a challenge. For an age, trapped in Suzuki's heel hook, his body existed in stasis. The painful story was plastered all over his face. That was how he generated sympathy. The suspense was manipulated by ringside charge Gedo, who teased throwing in the towel multiple times. There was more going on - but that image, of Okada in total command of the crowd lying on his back, is the indelible memory of it.
This was Okada's minimal masterpiece - the unsettling, powerful slow-burner in an album of mega hits.
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