Without a doubt, this was Minoru Suzuki's best match since returning to New Japan and it blew away their title match from earlier in the year. Was it perfect? Subjectively, no, but it's hard to pull off a flawless 30-minute draw without a little meandering here and there, and they did a damn good job of keeping things moving. What I loved about this match is that it played up Okada's weakness when it comes to his striking ability, with his elbows obviously puny compared to Suzuki's. In fact, Suzuki puts his hands behind his back to allow Okada to fire shots at him and still, Suzuki shuts him down. They got the Suzuki-gun shenanigans out of the way early, which allowed Suzuki to really tap into that "baddest motherfucker around" mentality as he starts in on Okada's injured neck, ripping the protective tape off and ragdolling him into the guardrail. I thought Okada's selling was really some of his best to date, always reminding us that he's fighting through the pain. But the bread-and-butter of this match is Suzuki wrecking the golden boy, between his strikes and him cranking away at the neck. I liked the transitions through the facelock, with Suzuki trapping the arm and going into a crossface and then just using a lot of headscissor variations to bend and twist the neck. Awesome stuff.
The crowd was way into Suzuki being a badass and the Gotch-style piledriver teases were well done, with the crowd eating them up. When Okada delivers the German to set up the first Rainmaker attempt, Suzuki counters with the sleeper, taking him over with that fantastic Saka Otoshi before cinching in the grounded sleeper. When that doesn't work, Suzuki starts paintbrushing him with slaps, jabs, and palm thrusts. Fucking great. Okada's able to hit a weak Rainmaker, holding onto the wrist, but when he tries for another, Suzuki slaps his hand away and then just bitch slaps him hard in the face, repeatedly. Okada does manage a few nasty shots of his own but again, it's nothing compared to Suzuki and Okada really sells the exhaustion and Suzuki's ruthlessness perfectly. There's an amazing moment toward the end when they smile at each other...Okada almost proud he withstood Suzuki's onslaught and Suzuki like "I can do this all day, kid." Then Suzuki smacks the hell out of him, trying once more for the sleeper and while Okada's able to avoid it and deliver another Rainmaker, he's a few drips past empty and can't follow up as the time limit expires. Probably my favorite match of the tournament thus far and a true testament of Okada's versatility on top. There wasn't a reliance on panty-soaking spots or over-the-top antics...I mean, the biggest move was probably Suzuki's Saka Otoshi. It was a terrific contrast of classic vs. modern, similar to what Suzuki did with Tanahashi a few years ago, but with a new ace at the helm.
No comments:
Post a Comment