25 Best Wrestling PPVs Ever
13. NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 9
Best Match: Shinsuke Nakamura Vs. Kota Ibushi
Worst Match: Mikey Nicholls & Naomichi Marifuji & Shane Haste & Toru Yano Vs. Davey Boy Smth Jr. & Lance Archer & Shelton Benjamin & Takashi Iizuka
This was the night on which Shinsuke Nakamura and Kota Ibushi achieved the impossible - and stole the show away from Kazuchika Okada and Hiroshi Tanahashi. Their match was the consummate pro wrestling sequel in that it surpassed the original while recalling its best sequences to jaw-dropping effect.
The story of the match was that the more spectacular Ibushi also had the better of Nakamura on the ground and standing up - which infuriated the King Of Strong Style so much that he infused his already-devastating strikes with a hitherto unseen venom. He even callously smashed him with kicks following a US-style ref bump.
Ibushi borrowed Nakamura's pithy kick taunt and Boma Ye - which Nakamura kicked out of at 1, like his opponent had done in the first match, to an incredulous pop. Nakamura ultimately put Ibushi away with his own, superior Boma Ye in a match which thoroughly warranted its ***** Wrestling Observer rating.
Okada and Tanahashi almost matched them, but that isn't to damn them with faint praise; their match, though less spectacular, was an instrumental component in setting the stage for Okada's coronation as company Ace one year later...