Young Lion’s Cup, baby. Young men in tiny black tights fighting to determine the future of New Japan Pro-Wrestling. Nothing says high stakes like Shinjuku FACE and one camera. Here we go.
Hirai Kawato vs. Ren Narita – Young Lion’s Cup Round 1
My boy Kawato is one of the more promising lads from this latest batch of young lions. He’s already leaning towards a hard-hitting junior style, which he puts on display here with some stiff middle kicks and a picture-perfect springboard dropkick. Meanwhile, Narita’s in the earlier stages of his fighting spirit journey of SELF DISCOVERY, so it’s harder to say to what he’s all about. He does sell a dropkick to the throat like a champ. Kawato picks up the win with a spinning enzuigiri right to the melon and we are moving on. **
Katsuya Kitamura vs. Tetsuhiro Yagi – Young Lion’s Cup Round 1
I love how the young lions all come out to the same theme music. Gotta earn that individuality, man. Fight for that shit. Kitamura’s already a step ahead of the other young lions by being a 31 year old uber-tanned ROID MONSTER with a vampire mouthguard. I’ve never seen Yagi before but he does a lot of impressive stuff here. They actually work an honest to God smart wrestling match with Yagi trying to neuter Kitamura’s obvious power advantage by breaking him down with submissions. Yagi busts out some truly inspired old school offense like a rolling neck snap and the god damned MUTA LOCK. Could he be the next Osamu Nishimura? Fingers crossed. Kitamura survives Yagi’s technical craftiness and slaughters him with chops before going FULL GOLDBERG with a Spear/Jackhammer combo for the finish. I liked all of this. **1/4
Tomoyuki Oka vs. Shota Umino – Young Lion’s Cup Round 1
Oka’s giving off some real Big Japan heavyweight vibes. No non-sense beefy bald guy that will mess you up, like a homegrown Tomohiro Ishii. Dude could almost be pushed as a throwback to the Riki Choshu/Kensuke Sasaki era of New Japan. Umino’s got a good look to him and seems pretty agile for a guy of his size, which could hint at a Tanahashi-type high-flying babyface direction. Anyway, they work this very similarly to the last match, as Umino tries to slow down big Oka by taking out his leg. Umino makes the mistake of disrespecting the big guy with a HEAD SLAP and pays for it dearly. Oka has hands down the most convincing execution of this group of youngsters. He will just run you over with forearms and power moves. Still, Umino tries hard to win my heart by breaking out the TENRYU FALLING ELBOWDROP off the top! Umino and Yagi need to team up as retro Japanese wrestling enthusiasts. They work a bunch of believable near-falls and near submissions until Oka drops Umino with a deadlift belly to belly suplex and slaps on that young lion-killing Boston crab. Crowd was waaay into this, and so was I. **1/2
Manabu Nakanishi vs. Kotaro Yoshino
Yoshino’s from Kaientai Dojo and seems to be working a Yone Genjin-type caveman comedy gimmick. Manabu Nakanishi needs no introduction, damn it. This is a total Sunday Night Heat squash match with Yoshino getting some hope spots and working the crowd with his comedy shtick. They do the ‘’can’t knock the big man down’’ routine with Yoshino really having to work hard on his shoulderblocks and body slams. Nakanishi continues the Tenryu homage storyline from the last match by doing the chop/jab combo in the corner and you love it. There’s a hilarious spot where Yoshino goes for an Irish-whip but Manabu won’t budge and just goes ‘’NO’’ before lariating the caveman down. The Argentine backbreaker does the trick and Yoshino has to crawl back to K-Dojo. Harmless. **
Satoshi Kojima & Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Yuma Aoyagi & Go Asakawa
Tenkoji might be stuck in midcard purgatory on the main roster cards, but at the Lion’s Gate shows they’re still SUPERSTARS! Asakawa’s a youngster from K-Dojo who worked Lion’s Gate shows in the past and Aoyagi’s one half of the current All-Asia tag champs in AJPW. The match is worked as a perfectly fine Tenkoji house show match. Formulaic but effective. The veterans spend the first half of the match cutting the ring in half and working over Asakawa. At some point Kojima busts out the glorious Russian legsweep into Ground Octopus combo, which I haven’t seen in ages. Shout out to my man EL SAMURAI~! Tenzan’s very convincing as the grumpy old guy headbutting indie scum kids into oblivion. Asakawa slowly mounts a comeback and makes the hot tag to Aoyagi who turns out to be kind of a lukewarm house on fire. Oh well. It’s the K-Dojo kid who ends up stealing the show with some pretty sweet offense including a wrist-clutch Blizzard suplex (or bridging Exploder ’98?) and a Kawada-tastic Stretch Plum. The ending stretch comes down to him and Kojima and it’s the Kojimeister who ends up catching Asakawa with a big Brainbuster and lariat for the win. Post-match, Aoyagi DENIES the Kojima handshake, which could hint at a future singles match between the two. Totally OK wrestling. Was more impressed by Asakawa than Aoyagi. **3/4
Yuji Nagata vs. Daisuke Kanehira
Nagata’s coming off that glorious Last G1 Ever run where he had awesome matches with everyone, so you better believe Nagatamania is running wild in Shinjuku FACE. I’ve never seen Kanehira before, but he is apparently from HEAT-UP, a low-level shoot-style sleaze promotion. The opening of the match is worked surprisingly even considering Nagata’s recent displays of grumpiness and Kanehira’s status as a complete nobody. Nagata actually lets the guy slap him around without retaliating with instant murder. Shocking stuff for 2017 Nagata. Kanehira seems to work some kind of BattlARTSian hybrid style. He’s also a living reminder that we live in a post-Shinsuke Nakamura universe where every indy wrestler needs to do a Boma-Ye knee strike variation. Thankfully, Nagata stops treating Kanehira as his equal sooner than later and starts mauling him with hard knees and kicks. Once in firm control of the match, Nagata rips his opponent’s arm apart with submissions. Kanehira’s selling isn’t so great as he just throws out forearms without showing any pain, even after being trapped in the DEMON ARMBAR. Come on dude. Kanehira almost redeems himself by pulling off a very cool hiptoss into cross armbreaker combo, which is something I feel KUSHIDA should steal if he doesn’t do it already. After taking some more of Kanehira’s offense, Nagata armbreakers his away out of a sleeper hold, fires off a good old enzuigiri and plants his opponent with the Backdrop hold for the finish. The parts of this where Nagata would firmly assert dominance were quite good. The guy could have a 3 star match with a broom stick at this point. Old man Yuji closes the show on the mic and all is well in the world. ***
Nothing on this show is really essential, but it’s fun to witness the progression of the young lions. Only watch this if you are a true Shinnichi Warrior.
