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Dragon Gate "Open the New Year Gate" on 1/16/14
review by Kevin Wilson
Date: January 16th, 2014 This is a pretty big card for Dragon Gate, as not only does it have an Open the Dream Gate Championship match, but the match is also Mochizuki's 20th Anniversary Match. The rest of the card is your usual Dragon Gate affair, no outsiders as they tend to only bring in Freelancers on really rare occasions. Here is the full card: - Don Fujii, Gamma, and "Hollywood" Stalker Ichikawa vs. Genki Horiguchi H.A.Gee.Mee!!, Jimmy Kanda, and Jimmy Kagetora Don Fujii, Gamma, and "Hollywood" Stalker Ichikawa vs. Genki Horiguchi H.A.Gee.Mee!!, Jimmy Kanda, and Jimmy Kagetora They decide this match was too quick as Ichikawa asks for the match to re-start. So they do, Kagetora quickly goes for the same move again but this time Ichikawa kicks out. Kagetora charges Ichikawa in the corner but Ichikawa moves and hits a tornado DDT. Fujii and Kanda come in the ring and trade chops, Fujii pushes Kagetora to the ropes and lariats him over it. Ichikawa and Gamma get in the ring and sail out of the ring with tope suicidas onto Kagetora and Kanda. Horiguchi gets in the ring but Fujii side-steps his attack attempt. Gamma gets back in the ring, double Irish whip to Horiguchi and Gamma hits a back elbow. Superkick by Gamma to Horiguchi, Ichikawa hits a German suplex hold on him but it gets a two count. Kagetora picks up Ichikawa and drops him with a front slam, cover, but it is broken up. Horiguchi picks up Ichikawa now and hits a brainbuster, Kagetora goes up to the top turnbuckle and hits a diving elbow drop, cover, but it only gets a two count. Kanda comes in the ring and elbows hits Ichikawa in the back, he goes off the ropes but Gamma hits him from the apron. Gamma then gets in the ring but Kanda catches him with an atomic drop. Gamma charges Kanda but Kanda hits a lariat. Gamma rolls out of the ring, Fujii comes in the ring and hits a German suplex onto Kanda. Ichikawa then comes in and goes for a suplex, but Kanda reverses it and hits a German suplex hold for the three count! Your winners again: Genki Horiguchi H.A.Gee.Mee!!, Jimmy Kanda, and Jimmy Kagetora Match Thoughts: Just a silly Dragon Gate opener, nothing more. A bit of a waste of some of these wrestlers but with Dragon Gate ya gotta take the good with the bad. Score: 2.5 Dragon Kid vs. Yosuke Santa Maria Match Thoughts: I gotta admit, Yosuke does make me laugh. Something about his mannerisms are so realistic and yet over the top, it cracks me up. That being said I don’t really like when selling the persona comes across as more important than winning matches, which in theory is what they should all be going for. So I will give it marks for being funny but it wasn’t really a match in the traditional sense of the word. Score: 6.0 BxB Hulk, Kzy, and Mondai Ryu vs. K-ness, Super Shisa, and Kenichiro Arai Arai tags in Shisa, Shisa knocks down Hulk, Irish whip to Kzy and Shisa elbows Kzy out of the ring. Shisa then goes to the ropes and hits a backwards slingshot headscissors out to the floor onto Kzy. Ryu and K-ness are in the ring, atomic drop by Ryu and he hits a jumping lariat. Cover, but it gets a two count. Ryu waits for K-ness to get up but K-ness reverses the waistlock and K-ness hits an enzigieri. Irish whip by K-ness to the corner and he hits a jumping elbow followed by a face crusher. Cover, but it gets a two count. Shisa comes in the ring as does Arai, Irish whip to Ryu from the corner and they hit elbow strikes followed by a Shisa reverse splash. K-ness then helps Arai hit a diving doublestomp, cover, but it gets a two count. Kick to the head by K-ness to Ryu, cover, but it gets another two count. Shisa uppercuts Kzy into the corner, Irish whip, but Kzy kicks Shisa back. Kzy goes up to the top turnbuckle but Shisa catches him with a headscissors. Hulk runs in and kicks Shisa low, and Hulk and Kzy both hit strikes on Shisa in the corner. Side slam by Hulk to Shisa, and he hits an assisted face crusher. Cover, but Shisa barely kicks out. Hulk picks up Shisa, Kzy goes up to the top turnbuckle but K-ness grabs him from the apron. Kzy pushes away K-ness but Shisa hits a headscissors on Kzy while he is still on the top turnbuckle. Uppercut by Shisa to Kzy, he goes off the ropes and they trade moves until K-ness runs in out of nowhere and hits the Hiraki no Wa on K-ness for a two count when Hulk breaks it up. Hulk goes off the ropes but K-ness catches him with a kick. K-ness goes off the ropes but Ryu kicks him from the apron. Kzy gets a metal box and hits K-ness and then Shisa with it, he goes to hit Shisa again but Arai hits an uppercut onto Kzy. Arai sails out onto Ryu and Hulk with a tope suicida, while in the ring Shisa hits the Yoshi Tonic onto Kzy. Cover, and he picks up the three count. Your winners: K-ness, Super Shisa, and Kenichiro Arai Match Thoughts: Not a bad match, but pretty average for six man Dragon Gate matches. I will always have a soft spot for K-ness since he was one of the first Dragon Gate wrestlers I ever saw and I like wrestlers in masks (at least I am honest). They kept the pace up as you’d expect and they worked together well, it just didn’t do anything to set it apart from any other mid-card Dragon Gate match. Solid, but not spectacular. Score: 5.5 CIMA and Chihiro Tominaga vs. Kotoka and Ryotsu Shimizu Match Thoughts: I will be honest, I think these rules are a bit silly. The two count rule just makes the moves have less significance... if wrestlers can always kick out at one, why in normal matches do they always kick out at two? Then the ending didn’t really have any relation to the rules since either way Kotoka wasn’t going to be able to make it to the ropes since he was near the middle of the ring. The action really wasn’t bad, but it was short and the match rules didn’t enhance the match for me. Score: 4.0 Shingo Takagi and Akira Tozawa vs. T-Hawk and U-T Chops by T-Hawk to Takagi and Tozawa, he goes to slam Takagi but Takagi blocks it. T-Hawk hits a jumping shoulderblock onto Tozawa, kick by Takagi but T-Hawk delivers a vertical suplex. T-Hawk grabs Tozawa, Irish whip from the corner, reversed, T-Hawk kicks Tozawa back and goes off the ropes but T-Hawk hits a chop to the chest. Tozawa gets back up but T-Hawk ducks a kick. Tozawa goes off the ropes but T-Hawk throws Tozawa in the air and hits a knee to the face. Spinning slam by T-Hawk, cover, but Takagi breaks it up. U-T comes in, he throws Takagi into the corner, reversed, Takagi gets kicked back and U-T hits a missile dropkick off the top turnbuckle. U-T drop toeholds Takagi into the turnbuckles, he goes off the ropes and hits a cutter. T-Hawk comes in the ring, double Irish whip to Takagi to the corner and both wrestlers hit running strikes. T-Hawk grabs Takagi but Takagi hits a back bodydrop. Takagi goes off the ropes and hits an elbow but T-Hawk returns with a chop. U-T hits a missile dropkick from the top turnbuckle, T-Hawk picks up Takagi and hits a sit-down powerbomb. Cover, but it gets a two count. Tozawa comes in the ring and trades elbows with U-T, Irish whip by U-T to the corner but U-T kicks Tozawa back. U-T goes up to the top turnbuckle but Tozawa quickly joins him up there and hits a superplex. Running boot by Tozawa in the corner and he hits a backdrop suplex to U-T. Cover, but it gets a two count. Double Irish whip to U-T, Takagi gets U-T into his back and hits the Blood Fall. German suplex hold by Tozawa, cover, but it gets a two count. T-Hawk comes in the ring, he goes off the ropes but Tozawa elbows him out of the ring and sails out onto him with a tope suicida. Takagi charges U-T in the corner and hits a running lariat. He goes for a slam but U-T reverses it and rolls up Takagi for a two count. U-T goes off the ropes but Takagi catches him with a German suplex. Takagi goes off the ropes and nails a running lariat, cover, but it gets a two count. Takagi goes off the ropes again and hits the Pumping Bomber, cover, and he gets the three count. Your winners: Shingo Takagi and Akira Tozawa Match Thoughts: Some parts of the match I quite enjoyed but others were a bit lacking. I liked that Takagi was the muscle that the two younger wrestlers tried to take down, and occasionally did but ultimately were not able to defeat. It was a solid arch to have throughout the match and it made sense that the young team would want to take down one of the more respected names in Dragon Gate. The loose tag rules do get in the way sometimes though, as when they finally got the advantage on Takagi and had him weakened, suddenly Tozawa came in the ring and just took over his battle. No fight for a tag, no desperate escape, nothing. So it was just a bit anticlimactic and hurt the flow of the match. Overall it was fun to watch though. Score: 6.0 Jimmy Susumu, Ryo "Jimmy" Saito, and Naoki Tanizaki vs. Naruki Doi, YAMATO, and Cyber Kong Tanizaki goes for a scoop slam onto Cyber Kong and finally is able to hit it. Tanizaki tags in Saito, YAMATO comes in as well, waistlock by Saito to YAMATO and then Susumu runs in the ring and does a sunset flip onto Saito, helping Saito suplex YAMATO. Doi comes in the ring, he goes off the ropes but Saito grabs him around the waist and Susumu hits a lariat. Tanizaki comes in the ring, he goes off the ropes and hits a tope con giro down onto Cyber Kong. Susumu and YAMATO are in the ring, and Susumu hits a running elbow on YAMATO in the corner. YAMATO elbows him back and goes off the ropes but Susumu catches him with a lariat. YAMATO doesn’t go down and the two trade chops and elbows, Susumu goes off the ropes but YAMATO blocks the lariat and throws Susumu into the corner. Dropkick by YAMATO, he goes off the ropes and hits a hard elbow. YAMATO goes off the ropes again but Susumu fires back with a lariat, cover, but Doi breaks it up. Doi stays in the ring as Saito comes in, Saito picks up Doi and goes off the ropes, elbow by Doi but Saito hits an overhead belly to belly suplex. YAMATO, Cyber Kong, Tanizaki, and Susumu all come into the ring, triple Irish whip by Cyber Kong and company, reversed, and all are drop toeholded. I know that isn’t a word. YAMATO and Cyber Kong get the better of things and they all hit strikes onto Saito. Powerbomb by Cyber Kong, cover, but Susumu breaks it up. Doi goes up to the top turnbuckle but Susumu joins him, and Susumu hits the Spanish Fly. Running kick by Tanizaki, Saito comes off the top turnbuckle with a body press onto Doi, cover, but Doi kicks out. Tanizaki picks up Doi but Doi wiggles away. YAMATO runs in the ring and dropkicks Tanizaki, Cyber Kong comes in the ring too and all three men hit strikes on Tanizaki in the corner. Pump-handle slam by YAMATO to Tanizaki and Doi hits a diving elbow drop. Cyber Kong goes up to the top turnbuckle and hits a diving elbow drop as well, cover, but Saito breaks it up. Saito hits Cyber Kong but Cyber Kong hits a splash followed by a lariat. Susumu comes in next to battle Cyber Kong, lariat by Susumu but Cyber Kong hits the Cyber Driver. Cover by Cyber Kong but it gets a two count. Doi runs in the ring and hits the Doi 555 on Susumu followed by the Bakatare Sliding Kick. Cover by Doi but Tanizaki breaks it up. Doi picks up Susumu, Susumu gets away and goes off the ropes but he is hit from the floor. Kanda runs in the ring and grabs the yellow box, and he hits Doi in the head with it. Susumu then goes off the ropes and drops Doi with the Jumbo no Kachi!gatame for the three count! Your winners: Jimmy Susumu, Ryo "Jimmy" Saito, and Naoki Tanizaki Match Thoughts: Dragon Gate matches can be so spastic. On one hand, it is exciting and fast paced, and there is literally no down time. But on the other hand I don’t like the way they handle transitions, it kills a lot of suspense for me when a wrestler can just run in and replace their partner just about whenever they want to. A wrestler can hit a few big moves but it means nothing when their opponents can switch out at will without a tag, it really just becomes a “who can hit the biggest move last” contest. So for excitement they get an A, it is more the structure that takes me out of it a bit. Score: 6.5 (c) Masato Yoshino vs. Masaaki Mochizuki Yoshino grabs Mochizuki and hits the Lightning Spiral, but Mochizuki springs up and kicks Yoshino in the chest. Two more kicks to the head by Mochizuki, he picks up Yoshino and he goes for a Twister, but Yoshino lands on his feet. Running boot to the face by Mochizuki, he goes off the ropes and hits a second one by Yoshino is not phased. Another running kick by Mochizuki but Yoshino comes back with the Udo Yoshino. Kick to the chest by Mochizuki as they trade moves, knee by Mochizuki and he nails the Twister. Cover by Mochizuki, but it gets a two count. Mochizuki goes up to the top turnbuckle but Yoshino catches him and hits a springboard slam off the top rope. Yoshino is up first, he goes up to the top turnbuckle but Mochizuki avoids his attack, Mochizuki goes off the ropes but Yoshino hits a Torbellino. Lightning Spiral by Yoshino, cover, but it gets a two count. Yoshino waits for Mochizuki to get up but Mochizuki kicks him in the chest. Chop by Yoshino and he goes off the ropes, hitting another Udo Yoshino. Sol Naciente by Yoshino but Mochizuki makes it to the ropes. Yoshino puts Mochizuki onto the top turnbuckle and goes up top as well, but Mochizuki hits a superplex. High kick by Mochizuki and he hits a second one, but Yoshino hits the Udo Yoshino. Mochizuki rolls up Yoshino but it only gets a two count. Mochizuki charges Yoshino in the corner but Yoshino catches him and hits a powerbomb. Triangle choke by Mochizuki but Yoshino powerbombs out of it. Yoshino and Mochizuki both get up, Yoshino goes off the ropes but Mochizuki hits a trio of kicks. One final high kick by Mochizuki, cover, but Yoshino gets a shoulder up. Mochizuki waits for Yoshino to get up and runs to the corner, but Yoshino grabs him. German suplex by Mochizuki but Yoshino lands on his feet, high kick by Mochizuki, he runs up the corner and nails the Shankakugeri to the Face. Mochizuki covers Yoshino, but Yoshino kicks out. Mochizuki picks up Yoshino, kicks to the chest by Mochizuki and they trade slams. Mochizuki goes off the ropes but Yoshino catches him with a lariat. Yoshino goes up to the top turnbuckle and hits a missile dropkick. Yoshino goes up to the top turnbuckle again and hits a second missile dropkick to Mochizuki’s back. Yoshino picks up Mochizuki and puts him up on the top turnbuckle, he goes up top as well and hits an avalanche Lightning Spiral. Cover, but Mochizuki kicks out. Yoshino grabs Mochizuki and puts him in the Sol Naciente, he tries to kick Yoshino to get out of it but Yoshino reverts it into the Sol Naciente Kai. Completely trapped, Mochizuki has no choice but to submit. Your winner and still champion: Masato Yoshino Match Thoughts: I thought this was a really good match, bordering on great except for some minor issues here and there. The arm work for the first third of the match was well done, but ultimately meaningless as it did not prevent any moves from being done nor did it really play into the end of the match. Old timers like Ultimo Dragon were always good at occasionally shaking the arm or having issues with a move to show the damage done but there was little effort here to do that. Yoshino tried his best to kill off a few of his biggest moves but not his big match finishers so it didn’t come across as burying them, although Yoshino has enough moves he didn’t need to keep doing the Lightning Spirals. The match was definitely exciting though and fast paced, no real downtime and the crowd really stayed into it. Mochizuki was a legitimate threat and was up to the challenge so it never felt like a lopsided match. Overall I enjoyed it, it was fun to watch even if it was a bit overkill at the end, I tend to be more forgiving of that in big main event title matches than I am in average mid-card matches. Definitely worth the watch. Score: 7.5 Final Thoughts: Best Match: Masato Yoshino vs. Masaaki Mochizuki. It wasn’t perfect but it was an exciting fast paced match that had a lot of killer moves and a decisive ending. About all you can ask for from a Dragon Gate main event match, my favorite match from the promotion so far this year. MVP: Masaaki Mochizuki. No one wrestler really set themselves apart since a lot of them looked good, but since it was Mochizuki's Anniversary Match and he looked really good in the title match I figured he deserved the nod. Even at his age he never looked tired or winded even after a long fast paced match, which I give him a lot of credit for, and he hit all of his moves flawlessly. Good showing by one of the original guard of Dragon Gate. Overall: This event was very…. Dragon Gate-y. I don’t know if that is a word, but what I mean is that it was about what you’d expect from the promotion – lots of fast paced action, crazy moves, and occasional overkill. Personally, I enjoy those types of matches in small doses spread throughout the card, and not the entire card, which is the reason in the past I didn’t really review full Dragon Gate events. Just not enough diversity for me. But if you aren’t overly concerned about things like ‘ring psychology’ and just want to relax to some crazy non-stop action, then I would definitely recommend it, but for other fans it may just all blend together into one big crazy blur of madness. Grade: B- Back to Dragon Gate Event Reviewsreview completed on 2/24/14 |
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