I had some time to kill so I decided to watch some of the Honor United stuff that just went up on New Japan World. As you might suspect, my decision-making skills have seen better days.
EVIL & SANADA vs. Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian (5/24/2018)
A fun crowd-pleaser with the Scottish fans being an awesome wrestling crowd: booing the heels, cheering the babyfaces and basically popping for everything. SANADA and Daniels brought the comedy with the Iizuka biting spots and Paradise lock sequences and the crowd was there for all of it. I hadn’t seen Daniels wrestle in a long time and the guy is still such a smooth worker. Not as high on Kazarian but his crowd trolling was top notch. As usual, great-looking dropkicks and pescado from SANADA. **3/4
Silas Young © vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. SANADA vs. Punishment Martinez – 4-Way Match – ROH TV Title (5/25/2018)
Watching Tana and SANADA work a goofy-ass indie 4-way match is a special thing. Punishment Martinez is a giant guy that has decided to bypass the monster wrestler archetype in favor of doing bad leg-slappy kicks and awkward flips. Indie wrestling in a nutshell. Young is a heel’s heel and I appreciate him taking the time to trash talk every single person in the front row. Loved Tanahashi being a total superstar and SANADA doing his Paradise lock shtick, but that’s about it. **1/2
EVIL vs. Dalton Castle – ROH World Title (5/25/2018)
What is going on with Castle’s bad fake punches? This was a question I kept asking myself for most of this match. From the amazing entrance to the rocking power pop theme song: Dalton’s a guy I really want to like but the wrestling is just not there. EVIL going after the injured knee was slightly more compelling than Dalton’s bad offense and I dug him beating the crap out of the Boys, but other than that the match struggled to keep my attention (and the crowd’s). **1/4
EVIL & SANADA vs. Matt Jackson & Nick Jackson vs. Vinny Marseglia & TK O’Ryan vs. Jay Briscoe & Mark Briscoe – 4-Corner Survival Tag Match (5/27/2018)
I’ve grown to appreciate the Young Bucks in the last year thanks to their matches in New Japan with Roppongi 3K and the Golden Lovers. They’re working smarter and adding more layers of story to their matches instead of just running through the Superkick Party shtick. This was the opposite of that. I guess they didn’t have that many options considering the stipulation and amount of people involved, but this was a Young Bucks match without a story and I couldn’t get into it. Too many cutesy, overly choreographed sequences and nothing to really chew on. The crowd seemed weirdly dead for everything except the Bucks high spots. The Kingdom came off as the most listless pair of indie dudes. Meh. **1/2
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Hangman Page (5/27/2018)
This was Tanahashi and Page working a meat and potatoes house show match – very serviceable but not something that’ll stick with you for very long. The contrast in personalities was pretty staggering in this thing. Page hasn’t much going for him in that department, but Tana was able to keep the crowd alive for the whole match with his top-level babyfacing. They did show solid chemistry in terms of stringing spots together and Page did a good job adapting to some of Tana’s physical limitations. It’ll be interesting to see if they can put together a meatier match for the G1 this year. **3/4
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