The Navigation Log 4.22.07: The 4/28 Budokan Show
Posted by Matt Short on 04.22.2007
Everyone plays at the Budokan. Cheap Trick did it. Next week NOAH is going to run one of their monthly shows to the delight of all. The card features three huge title matches are set as well as a NOAH vs. Dragon Gate Six Man.
Anyone else have a long week? Between feeling like I'm going to throw up everywhere and hearing about the V Tech shootings back home, it's definetly not been the best past seven days. I could get on the Internet soapbox and talk a bit about the V Tech stuff, but this isn't the place for it and I'm not the person who should be doing it. So onto the NOAH.
We're in the last legs of NOAH's Spring Navigation. On the 20th Kentaro Shiga and Kishin Kawabata successfully defended their Hardcore Tag Team titles in Nagoya. The tour rolls on until the 28th for the Budokan show. The full card has finally been released, but too late for me to decide if I care to put down the money for good tickets.
That aside the card looks quite good. There are three big title defenses that night, as well as a Dragon Gate special attraction match. So this week, we're taking a look at the full card now and next week I'll post the results for your perusal.
Pro Wrestling NOAH: 4/28 LIVE~! At the Budokan!
1: Junji Izumida & Makoto Hashi vs. Mitsuo Momota & Tsutomu Hiyaranagi
-Should be a decent curtain jerker. Izumida and Hashi are just getting off their loss after their attempt at the Hardcore Tag Titles. They'd like to get some momentum as they go against your classic veteran and rookie team. Hiyaranagi has only been around for a few years now, while his partner Momota I can only describe at NOAH's version of Ric Flair. Only without Flair's massive collection of titles. Be that as it may, he has the skills and experience to teach the young guys coming up. Won't be a great match, but I'm interested to hear how Hiyaranagi does.
2: Akira Taue, Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Shuhei Tangiuchi vs. Kentaro Shiga, Kishin Kawabata & Joe Legend
-The team of Taue, Kanemaru, and Tangiuchi are a group of well traveled vets. Shiga and Kawabata are the Hardcore tag champs and Joe Legend is a generic big man gaijin. Not too much here to get excited about in my opinion. Five of these guys I'd consider good to great, while what I've seen from Legend has just been blah. Keep it short and all will be fine. Easy mark out moment if Taue busts out his Ore Ga Taue finisher though.
3: Mohammed Yone, KENTA & Taiji Ishimori vs. Bryan Danielson, Daniel Cross & Ted DiBiase Jr.
-Another six-man? Well they do try to get as many people onto a card as possible. This could steal the undercard show as there isn't really a bad worker in this group. The only possible weak link is DiBiase Jr. From what of his that I've seen, he's got potential but is still incredibly green. I'm glad he's at least been getting ring time with guys like Danielson and KENTA so he can improve. He's been doing the job in all of his matches to this point. While that will probably continue here, there's a chance they could send him home with one win from his tour in NOAH.
4: Yoshinari Ogawa, Tamon Honda & Tsuyoshi Kikuchi vs. Bison Smith, Akitoshi Saito & Masao Inoue
-This match is awesome simply because of Kikuchi. He's one of my favorite older guys on the NOAH roster because he's just the type of blue chipper you can watch and enjoy. Add to that a great light weight in Ogawa and one of the stiffest men on the roster in Saito and this match really can't go wrong. This is going to be a hard hitting affair. Honda is getting on in years, but he still throws some hard chops and has a pretty sick German suplex. Bison Smith and Inoue will bring some power moves and Kikuchi will give the match its personality.
5: Inter-promotional 6-Man-Naomichi Marufuji, Ricky Marvin & Ippei Ota vs. CIMA, Susumu Yokosuka & Dragon Kid
-Dragon Kid is taking Anthony W. Mori's place here. As if that's a bad replacement. NOAH guys have been working Dragon Gate matches in the past few months, so this is a returning of the favor I guess. Can you say insane spots? They really put all their eggs into one basket with this match and this can easily be match of the night. I'd personally mark for the chance to see Ricky Marvin hook it up with Dragon Kid. But I think a lot of the attention could end up going to Marufuji and CIMA as they're top stars of their respective promotions.
6: GHC Jr. Heavyweight Title: Tatsuhito Takaiwa (c) vs. Mushiking Terry
-Takaiwa is a NOAH outsider and has essentially dominated the Jr. Heavyweight scene since his win in December. Mushi-King Terry is easily one of the most over stars in NOAH right now. Kids love him because he's tied in with an anime and everyone else loves him because he's one of the most exciting Juniors around. Terry's been on a roll since the last Budokan show where he got a big win over Rocky Romero. Since Kotaro Suzuki, the man behind the mask, is already Jr. Heavyweight tag team champion I can see the belt changing hands here.
7: GHC Tag Team Title: Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio (c) vs. Yoshihiro Takayama & Takashi Sugiura
-The story here is that Sugiura has been working to move into Heavyweight title contention. Last month he lost a great non-match against Misawa via TKO and on 4/20 actually pinned former GHC Champion and current Tag Team Champion Jun Akiyama. Thus, this match was made. This is a rather hard match to predict a winner for to be honest. NOAH seems very interested in pushing Sugiura and he's got the fan support for it. Akiyama and Rikioh can both stand to take a loss here, it won't have any adverse effect on them. Akiyama is after all the guy who put over Marufuji as champ last year, so he's got no problem with putting over the juniors. But they did just win the belts this month and this isn't the same case as The Briscoes, when they needed to get the belts off a team that was leaving. While Sugiura's partner Takayama is a beast, no title change here but a nice competitive match where everyone gets to look good.
8: GHC Heavyweight Title: Mitsuharu Misawa (c) vs. Takuma Sano
-Sano has been one of those perennial title challengers who can never quite make it to the top. He's gotten his shots in the past, but came up short. Misawa was originally thought of as a transitional champion until Morishima got the belt, but that doesn't seem to be the case any more. At least until Morishima drops the ROH title anyway. I like Sano, but if he wins the title here I'll dance a soft shoe across the giant pedestrian crossing in Shibuya.
Back Home
Let's talk some Ring of Honor. Specifically, NOAH vs. ROH.
Right now ROH seems to be putting a lot of energy into making their Japan tour a huge success. And it's working the wrestling press has been all over Morishima's huge title win and his defenses. When the wrestling magazines come out next week, they're going to have a nice spread of Morishima vs. McGuinness.
The NOAH crowds are getting excited about the possibility of ROH coming here. Because they have seen just what the company can offer through the stars they've sent in the past. Bryan Danielson is on his second tour right now and the crowds pop instantly when he gets in the ring. He's at the point where he's allowed to get the fall in some of his matches. The Briscoes had caught on strong by the time they had to drop the titles and Rocky Romero is a semi-regular with NOAH. G+ TV has also been showing ROH matches featuring NOAH stars, like Homicide vs. Morishima and KENTA vs. Bryan Danielson. Since ROH had announced their Japan tour I had wondered if it was something that would actually work. They're not going to have the regular style of ROH crowd and who knows how many Japanese fans are going to actually care about an American indy company.
But they do care about it believe it or not. The show I went to featuring The Briscoes had a fair number of people who knew who they were and knew what ROH was. Hell, there was a couple people decked out in ROH regalia. So while ROH is going into a country that treats its wrestling in an entirely different light than anything in the states, they're going to be fine.
And speaking of more NOAH vs. ROH news, they've set up some great matches in the coming weeks. Coming up this weekend Morishima has two huge title defenses one against Austin Ares and if he makes it through there, against SHINGO. Morishima vs. Ares is definitely going to draw comparisons to Joe vs. Ares, and playing into that is great hype for the match. If Morishima gets past Ares to SHINGO that is going to have big implications for NOAH and Dragon Gate as they're having two high profile wrestlers going after a world title. It certainly draws some extra attention to the recent cross promotion between NOAH and Dragon Gate lately.
KENTA and Marufuji are also going to do a small stint with ROH next month. KENTA will go up against Delirious and Marufuji faces off with Matt Sydal. These are two great pairings and probably the best ROH could have made at the moment. KENTA vs. Delirious might seem like a huge clash of styles, but it can easily work. Believe it or not, KENTA can work some comedy into his matches and his striking style should mesh well with Delirious' style of….doing whatever. Marufuji and Sydal match up better than so might expect. Marufuji is a great flier without putting as many flips and flops into it as Sydal does. But he can easily match Sydal in the air if he has to.
Short Takes
-It's been a long, long week.
-American Balloon is my hero.
-Next weekend is the King of Europe tournament. It's a huge, international independent wrestling tournament featuring guys from companies as big as TNA to the small guys like Chikara.
-I predict Chris Hero vs. Claudio Castagnioli is going to be the hot feud on the independent circuit this year.
-What are the odds that anyone in the Milan crowd would be a real wrestler? What? What's a crowd plant?
That's all for this edition of the Navigation Log. Have a good week and if you're a mid-card champion don't offer open challenges. You never know who's actually in attendance. Love and peace.
