Konosuke Takeshita vs. MAO – D-Oh Grand Prix (Block B)
In the same vein as their KO-D tournament match from earlier this year, with Big Ace Takeshita refusing to play along with MAO’s cutesy bullshit and forcing his fellow sauna enthusiast to get serious. The Duality of MAO was very much on display here, as I’d find myself groaning at his tropes and then would have to pick my jaw from off the floor over him doing a perfect Matrix dodge to avoid the Take flying lariat. His new headscissors obsession added some fresh twists and turns to their usual bombs-away ending stretch. Takeshita’s strength spots were as impressive as ever and MAO really put some mustard on those last few Osaka Rinkai Uppers. Very pleasant wrestling. ***1/2
Chris Brookes vs. Yuji Okabayashi – D-Oh Grand Prix (Block B)
More rock-solid three and a half star professional wrestling. Asymmetrical haircut expert Chris Brookes foolishly tried to start a chop fight with the Golem and it led to a tasty ass whooping. The always reliable Shinjuku FACE crowd and various ring-side characters were a big help in babyfacing the be-jeezus out of Brookes, who quickly became a sympathetic underdog in the face of chop-throwing adversity. They put together some really satisfying near-falls and counters in the back end of the match, both guys showing unexpectedly tight chemistry. Enjoyed all of this! ***1/2
Yuji Hino vs. The Bodyguard – D-Oh Grand Prix (Block A)
Considering how low my expectations were after the Bodyguard/Yoshimura disaster, I guess this overdelivered. They stuck to baseline meathead wrestling tropes and Hino was able to pull something very watchable out of good ol’ Bodyger. They milked their headlocks like a pair of 80’s WWF monsters, threw some chops and lariats, then called it a day. Bodyguard comically failing to sell the big Camel clutch struggle almost tanked the match, but they rebounded nicely with some juicy near-falls before the finish. ***
Yuki Ueno vs. Naomi Yoshimura – D-Oh Grand Prix (Block A)
NAUTILUS COLLIDES. This was the Naomi Yoshimura showcase that the big boy couldn’t have in his first match with Bodyguard and it kicked ass. They leaned into a gritty power vs. technique-type layout with both guys playing the familiarity card and beating the shit out of each other. Yoshimura aced his Size Advantage 101 college course and put it all to very good use here, making his former partner work for everything and cutting off all of his fancy lucha armdrags early on.
Ueno’s accidental bloody nose gave an extra edge to all the strike-trading and helped crank up the drama during the second half. I’m pretty sure they have an even better match in them, but this still gave us an enticing preview of what the future KO-D title scene might look like. ***1/2
Jun Akiyama vs. Tetsuya Endo – D-Oh Grand Prix (Block A)
These two had an absolute shredder of a KO-D title match back in February. While this wasn’t on the same level, it still snuck up on me and gradually turned into a pretty compelling wrasslin’ match. Akiyama is one of the select few who can make me care about a Babyface Endo match structure. So even if some of the early sections here felt a little bland, you could still do a lot worse than Uncle Jun beating the brakes off a pretty boy.
Thanks to Endo publicly bragging about his rollup-centric strategy to win the tournament, the drama reached a surprisingly high pitch when those cradles came flying in during the ending stretch. They ended up using that story perfectly to pull off the mother of all subversive finishes, confirming once again that Akiyama has the largest brain in wrestling. ***1/2
