NJPW Fighting Spirit Unleashed Review and Results

from njpw1972.com

NJPW returned to the US for the fourth time on Sunday night as the road to Wrestle Kingdom 13 continues. What went down on the undercard? Did the show’s big four matches deliver or fall short?

SHO, YOH, & Rocky Romero vs Ryusuke Taguchi, Jyushin Thunder Liger, & ACH

YOH and JTL kick off the show. Dropkick from Yoh. Titlawhirl backbreaker from Liger, and he locks in the Romero Special as ACH and Taguchi intercept SHO and Romero with ankle locks. Taguchi Japan briefly hold the momentum, until YOH fights back and Romero and SHO return to back him up. They work over Liger with tandem offense, but the veteran gets creative, taking out all of RPG 3K before tagging in ACH.

SHO takes quite a bit of punishment, but is able to get back into the match with a timely german. Tags to Taguchi and Romero. The funky weapon misses its mark at first, but Taguchi gets another chance and all of his opponents eat hip attacks. 3K tries to fight back, but the dodon keeps Romero down for the three count.

This was a good, lighthearted opener. Taguchi was great and added that extra layer of quirky fun like only he can. On the other hand, I think RPG 3k could use some more success, but as long as SHO and YOH aren’t taking pins I guess it doesn’t really matter.

Rating: **3/4

Hangman Page & Chase Owens vs Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian

Page and Kazarian start things off. They run the ropes and trade strikes. Neither man can get the advantage, so they tag in their partners. The addiction gets some tag team offense going, but Page breaks up their momentum. Kazarian’s back in, and Hangman works him for awhile before tagging back to Owens. He tries to finish things off, but Frankie breaks free and gets the hot tag to Daniels.

The Fallen Angel runs off some great offense on both of his opponents and gets a near fall with a facebuster. Page explodes back with a buckshot lariat, and goes for the shooting star press on Kazarian, but it’s countered. Back in the ring, Owens sets up Daniels for the package piledriver, but Kazarian’s back in to break it up and the BME/tombstone combo finishes it.

Unlike the previous match, this stayed away from comedy and instead packed a lot of good wrestling into a very short time frame. Fast paced sprints like this can sometimes feel like clunky spotfests, but this was really good and flowed well. I thought Page and Owens could’ve used a win to get momentum heading into a possible tag league bid, but Daniels and Kazarian are great, so whatever.

Rating: ***