NJPW Kizuna Road Results
June 20, 2017
Korakuen Hall in Tokyo, Japan
Tomoyuki Oka vs. Tetsuhiro Yagi
Short and simple opening match, but a good showing for both Young Lions. Oka has a huge size advantage and took control right away with some basic holds. Yagi caught him in a heel hook and chipped away with submissions, focussing on the ankle and lower back. Oka fought him off and tossed him around with a trio of big bodyslams, selling his back throughout. He locked in a Boston Crab, bounced up and down to apply pressure and that was all she wrote.
Jushin Thunder Liger, Tiger Mask & Syota Umino vs. Taka Michinoku, El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru
In typical fashion Suzuki-Gun attacked before the bell and everyone brawled around ringside. Liger fought back and put Desperado in a Surfboard Stretch, and wouldn’t let up the hold even when the other two were beating him down. Umino tagged in and went crazy on them, but eventually got caught by the traditional SKG numbers game. They built up the hot tag to Tiger Mask who came off the top with a crossbody and cleaned house, hitting Kanemaru with the Tiger Driver. Umino came back in to get his revenge, firing up on everyone, until the match broke down into an all-out brawl. Taka made Umino tap to an Argentine leglock variation while the others were fighting.
David Finlay & Yuji Nagata vs. Katsuya Kitamura & Manabu Nakanishi
The two veterans started things out chopping each other down with some basic kicks and elbows. Kitamura wrecked Finlay as he’s easily twice his size, until he got caught with a nice looking missile dropkick. Nagata came in and stomped the holy hell out of the big man like it was his job (which, I guess…technically it is). Eventually Nakanishi saved his partner and they applied stereo Torture Racks. Finlay fought back and brawled with Kitamura to the floor, as Nagata planted Nakanishi with a big back suplex for the pin. This was basic but fun, and the most I’ve seen Blue Justice fired up in awhile.
Satoshi Kojima, Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Togi Makabe vs. Toru Yano, Jado & Tomohiro Ishii
Makabe and Ishii started out trying to ram each other over, looking like they’d just run a marathon about 30 seconds into the match. Tenzan gave Jado some signature chops and tried for the running Kokeshi to get that Honma pop but came up empty. The two big brutes fought up into the stands as Jado gave Tenzan the lightest love tap from a chair I’ve ever seen; god bless him, he sold it like a million bucks though. Yano finally contributed something to the match mocking the Mongolian chops, then got lit up by Kojima with the machine gun chops and dropped with a cutter. CHAOS ran a train on Makabe until the others made the save. Jado took the Tencozy Cutter and a King Kong Knee Drop from Makabe for the pin.
Hiroshi Tanahashi & Hirai Kawato vs. Tetsuya Naito & Hiromu Takahashi
The heels attacked Kawato before the match and spent the early parts of the match working him over. The crowd was super into him any time he tried to fight back, and popped huge for the hot tag to Tanahashi. The Ace spun Naito with a Dragonscrew but came up empty on a second rope senton splash, and Naito immediately went after his bandaged up arm. After a good back and forth exchange Kawato was begging to get his revenge. Tana granted him the tag and the Young Lion came in like a bat out of hell, running through Hiromu with quick offense and even knocking Naito off the apron for good measure. He fired off with a huge chop to Takahashi and a nice standing dropkick, but eventually got slowed down by a double team from LIJ. Naito beat down Tanahashi on the floor, throwing him into the barricade, as Hiromu put the rookie in a Boston Crab and pulled him back to the center of the ring for the submission. For a short match it had a lot of intensity, and Kawato absolutely stole the show and is quickly becoming the go-to guy for a big comeback spot. Lots of potential in that one.
Kazuchika Okada, Hirooki Goto & Yoshi-Hashi vs. Minoru Suzuki, Davey Boy Smith Jr. & Taichi
Yoshi-Hashi went right after Minoru and hit him with what must have been 30 consecutive elbows. The referee tried to stop him and YH threw him across the ring before going right back to it. Because Suzuki is a literal demon the barrage didn’t seem to affect him at all, because he was actually smiling through all of it. The faction leader took YH to the floor and beat the gel out of his hair with a table and some seriously stiff shots from a chair. More typical Suzuki-Gun shenanigans as Taichi used his bell hammer and nobody did anything about it. They all took turns assaulting Goto until finally the champion tagged in and turned the tide for CHAOS…briefly. Davey worked him over with suplexes and elbows until Okada threw a dropkick and tagged back in YH. He and Minoru went back at it, as YH fired off with another barrage of elbows doing literally nothing, and Minoru dropped him with a single, brutal elbow. He kept getting back up, and Suzuki kept destroying him with strikes. Eventually a brawl broke out and YH ended up tapping out Taichi to the Butterfly Lock.
Suzuki-Gun immediately attacked YH after the match but the guy just refused to give up, clearing the ring and going back after Minoru until both teams and all the Young Lions had to split the two apart.
Bushi, Sanada & Evil (c) vs. Ryusuke Taguchi, Juice Robinson & Kushida for the NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag Team Titles
This was a super fun match with just a ridiculous final couple of minutes. Kushida and Bushi opened things up with a nice back and forth display, coming up even and backing off to their corners. Taguchi came in and, after doing his drop-down spot where he makes Sanada run the ropes forever, literally just punched the guy in his balls. Because they’re also a baseball team, Taguchi played catcher while Juice waited for his pitch, then seeing a call he liked, destroyed Sanada with a cannonball splash into the corner. The other members of LIJ ruined the fun with a triple team on Robinson, then took turns working him over with quick tags for several minutes. Eventually Taguchi made the hot tag and hit everyone with his butt. Evil almost caught him with a deadlift German suplex but was rolled up into the ankle lock. Taguchi did all his ridiculous Nakamura mockery, but ran into an atomic drop from EVIL followed by a superkick to his butt. Kushida and Bushi tagged in to end things the way they started, in another great back and forth. Kushida took down Evil and Bushi with handspring dropkicks, then sent Sanada flying with a headscissors takedown. He put Bushi in the Hoverboard Lock and Juice flew off the top rope with the Kokeshi while he was trapped. Robinson fired up and took out Evil with a standing dropkick and a huge Spinebuster (seriously a thing of beauty) then flew off the top rope with a diving crossbody on Sanada. They went into a series of big moves – Kushida hit a springboard dropkick to Sanada, Bushi hit the Codebreaker on Kushida, Taguchi took out Bushi with a flying rump attack, Evil took out Taguchi, and Juice ended it all with a huge lariat to the big man. The babyfaces all hit stereo kicks on Sanada and looked to have it won with a variation of the Doomsday Device, but it got broken up at the last minute. Juice then destroyed Sanada with a brutal powerbomb, but he somehow kicked out at two-and-a-half. The two had an amazing series of counters looking for Pulp Friction and the Skull End, until Evil came out of nowhere and blasted Robinson with a chair. Bushi hit the second rope Codebreaker on him, then flew threw the ropes to take out Kushida, as Sanada finally got the Skull End locked in on Juice to retain.
Overall a decent show with a great main event, but nothing else to write home about. It’s a minor tour that really just exists to fill time before the G1 and announce the participants in this year’s tournament, but for what it was I had some fun with it.
