Edwin

Stephanie said maybe someone the WWE Universe hasn't seen could win the Royal Rumble... Is that a sign that maybe AJ Styles makes his debut in the Royal Rumble match as it's been rumored or is this something that's already been reported is not occurring? Sure if he debuted he won't win it, but maybe he does make his debut during that match.

Soccer has been booming a lot in the US and is only going to continue grow specially in the last 4 or 5 years. The MLS is just continuously growing stateside with things like David Beckham starting a new franchise in Miami and more American TV channels picking up foreign EPL, La Liga, Bundesliga and Serie A matches. I don't think it's farfetched that it could be the second biggest sport in the US within the next 10 years. This reminds me of that one time when Dana White said that the UFC was as big as the NFL and that it was almost as big as soccer...

I agree with tim in the sense that this did a fine job of showcasing the modern NJPW style. However I can’t agree with this being a NJPW MOTY or anything. Ibushi really made Okada’s offense look a lot better than most of the NJPW heavyweights. He just flows along with Okada’s offense and it actually looks brutal. Even Okada’s crappy looking tombstone piledriver looks decent here. Ibushi reversing Okada’s Rainmaker and nailing his own was a good looking spot and Ibushi’s one was brutal. Sucks he followed it up with what looked like a huge botched lariat that didn’t even seemed like it grazed Okada. Loved how Okada kept the waist lock on Ibushi after the beautiful high bridging German suplex leading to the Rainmaker even if it looked weak here. Good stuff either way, but definitely not a match for those of you who don’t enjoy the current New Japan style.

I was really looking forward to this one due to how much I enjoyed their previous match, but this was hugely disappointing. They tried recreating some of the submission sequences while mixing in some new ones, but just failed to do so as the setups to a lot of the spots were really weak and slow. CIMA was particularly off her and Shisa did nothing to help. The finishing stretch was particularly different and it was totally heatless and uninteresting.

Not particularly a great match, but definitely a good one. Easily the best and only noteworthy match from the Dome Show. Okada needs to work on his tombstone piledriver though. He makes it look like a really low impact move. I'm sure he can probably learn how to make it look vicious without breaking his opponents from various Joshi wrestlers or Mexican luchadors. Loved Naito's headbutts. Also loved how Okada doesn't go overboard with the use of the Rainmaker and one is more than enough.

I watched it a while ago since someone posted it on the PWG of the UG and it does stand up pretty well. HHH's performance in this was great. The beating he took, his groggy selling, etc. was fantastic. I know Foley's character was that he could withstand an incredible amount of punishment, but he pretty much no sold 95% of HHH's offense which I thought was a little to over the top for his character and much worse since he was going to lose anyway.

FOTY surpassing Trujillo vs. Varner.

Easily the best match in Japan this year by a huge margin. Ishii’s just been having great matches all year and finally they give Honma a chance to showcase himself in a big singles match and he doesn’t disappoint. Everything in this match worked. Everything. Not a single thing I didn’t enjoy. I particularly loved Honma’s crazy diving headbutt off the top to the floor, Honma’s deadlift brainbuster, Honma’s fire thunder driver and the king sized brutal finishing stretch. I think it’s also worth noting that Ishii is probably the best Japanese wrestler at taking a DDT and at selling a shoulder after a huge release German suplex.

Some of these aren't particularly great, but this is just so you can get your feet wet and get an idea of what's out there for Puerto Rican wrestling: Carlos Colon vs. Stan Hansen cage match from 1987: Abdullah the Butcher vs. Bruiser Brody: Carlos Colon vs. Jason the Terrible barb wire match from 1989: Carlos Colon vs. Chicky Starr cage match from 1986: Ricky Banderas and Shane vs. Chicky Starr and Victor the Bodyguard from 1/6/2002:

I hardly watch anything live. I tried sitting through some of episodes of RAW this year, but it being 3 hours kinda killed my interest in it. I do watch some PPVs occasionally. I also occasionally watch the highly hyped matches of wrestlers I really dig like Cesaro, DBryan or Ishii. I've realized I don't get burned out or bored watching it this way. MMA I do watch live, namely UFC events when I have the chance to and the occasional JMMA live stream when available if I don't have to wake up early the next day. I also watch the highly regarded fights from smaller organizations.

Not sure where to post this, but from the UFC weight ins:

This was great. This match cements Shibata as the GOAT soccer kicker or second best behind Kazuyuki Fujita. He just full blown blasts Akiyama early in the match and that visually pisses off Akiyama to the point where he goes all out stiffing Shibata back and that pretty much sets the pace for the remainder of the match as they just blasts each other endlessly. Just a great, hate filled brawl all over the place.

I thought this was very good. If there's anyone who can throw strikes with Kana, it's Shuri. She has legit stand up fighting background as she's fought in JEWELS, Shoot boxing and KRUSH. Sadly she holds back a bit here. One thing I personally love about Kana is the way she sets up submissions and transitions from one to another. Also Shuri does a tremendous job at putting over Kana's leglocks visually reminiscing in pain meanwhile being caught in them. Kana also pays tribute to Ryo Chonan in this pulling out the flying scissor heel hook Chonan used to beat Anderson Silva in PRIDE and she also pulled a sweet looking flying armbar here.

Yeah, never mind...

Just skimmed through it and it didn't look that good. Karl Anderson holding onto the referee forever so Yujiro could hit Okada with the Tokyo Pimps and all the interference's aren't things I enjoy that much, so I'm not sure I'd enjoy this match as some others. Ishii/Honma before that from the same card is the match I've enjoyed the most from Japan this year from what I've seen though.

Posted it here: http://prowrestlingonly.com/index.php?/topic/26205-great-ufc-fights-2012-on/?p=5602142 I tried being as extensive as possible and I got pretty much everything you should watch on there.

Here's a list of non UFC fights to check out from that period too: Shintaro Ishiwatari vs. Caol Uno (Shooto 10th Round) Eddie Alvarez vs. Michael Chandler II (Bellator 106) Sidney Oliveira vs. Marcus Vinicius (Jungle Fight 49) Anthony Birchak vs. Ryan Benoit (MFC 37) Masakatsu Ueda vs. Kevin Belingon (ONE FC 9) Leonard Garcia vs. Nick Gonzalez (Legacy FC 23) Nataniel Roberto vs. Adriano Gonsalves (Bitetti Combat 14) Jang Yong Kim vs. Mark Striegl (PXC 39) Dan Cramer vs. Brian Rogers (Bellator 89) Junior Boya vs. Marcus Vinicius (Jungle Fight 55) Mario Israel vs. Nildo Nascimiento (Jungle Fight 53) Yui Chul Nam vs. Takasuke Kume I (ROAD FC 11) Tadaaki Yamamoto vs. Masayoshi Kato (Shooto Border) Doo Ho Choi vs. Shoji Maruyama (DEEP Cage Impact) Tatsumitsu Wada vs. Yuki Motoya (DEEP 63 Impact) Jessica Andrade vs. Milana Dudieva (PRO FC 47) Sherilyn Lim vs. Ann Ossman (ONE FC 11) Hernani Perpetuo vs. Tommy Depret (Shooto Brazil 42) Carlos Diego Ferreira vs. Jorge Patino (Legacy FC 25) Remy Bussieres vs. Blake Pool (Bellator 103) Alexander Shelemenko vs. Brett Cooper II (Bellator 98) Kyoji Horiguchi vs. Hiromasa Ogikubo (Shooto 2nd Round) Doo Ho Choi vs. Tatsunao Nagakura (DEEP 61 Impact) Kyoji Horiguchi vs. Shintaro Ishiwatari (VTJ 2nd) Yui Chul Nam vs. Takasuke Kume II (ROAD FC 13) Will Campuzano vs. Hideo Tokoro (VTJ 3rd) Leonardo Mafra vs. Samuel Trindade (Iron FC 3) Bubba Jenkins vs Mike Barreras (Bellator 97) Jong Wang Kim vs. Seigo Mizoguchi II (DEEP Cage Impact) Taisuke Okuno vs. Akihiro Gono (DEEP 62 Impact) Michelle Waterson vs. Jessica Penne (Invicta FC 5) Kendall Grove vs. Joe Vedepo (Bellator 104) Shane Johnson vs. Fard Muhammad (Tuff-N-Uff) Ryan Couture vs. KJ Noons (Strikeforce) D'Juan Owens vs. Diego Wilson (300 Sparta 3) Tecia Torres vs. Rose Namajunas (Invicta FC 6) Jeremias Fernandez vs. Tomas Vasquez (Arena Tour 1) Daniel Swain vs. Tadahiro Harada (Pancrase 245) Noboru Tahara vs. Takuya Eizumi (Pancrase 245) Andrews Nakahara vs. Jung Hwan Cha (ROAD FC 13) Joachim Hansen vs. Doo Won Seo I (ROAD FC 11) Tecia Torres vs. Felice Herrig (Invicta FC 7) Cassie Rodish vs. Stephanie Frausto (Invicta FC 4) Ikuhisa Minowa vs. Atsushi Sawada (Inoki Bom-Ba-Ye 2013) Sanshiro Nakakura vs. Takahiro Kawanaka (DEEP Cage Impact) Koji Oishi vs. Honorio Banario (ONE FC 9) Pearl Gonzales vs. Cortney Casey (XFC 26) Herica Tiburcio vs. Kinberly Novaes (MMA Super Heroes 1) Kailin Curran vs. Kaiyana Rain (PXC 36)

I thought this was a really strange match. I tried to like this, but I just didn’t really enjoy that much of it outside of the short Rush/Ishii exchanges, the sick lariat by Escorpion on Rush and the nasty double undertook piledriver spot by Rush on Escorpion. The Ishii/Naito exchanges here weren’t as wild as of their previous interactions and Naito himself was totally out of it in this match. Halfway through the match he tried to keep up with the fast pace Rush and Escorpion had in their exchange, but he failed miserably to do so and I thought it looked bad on him. Also Escorpion’s diving guillotine leg drop looked really bad.

Tomohiro Ishii vs. KUSHIDA (NJPW, 4/12/2014; Taiwan University Gymnasium NTU Sports Center) Tomohiro Ishii vs. Tomoaki Honma (NJPW, 5/3/2014; Fukuoka International Center)

If anyone is willing to do said thing, I'd be down to support this and add in my opinion on what's good and what's not good since I do indeed follow MMA a lot more so than I do wrestling. I did post an extensive list of the best UFC fights from the last 3 years in this thread: Great UFC fights 2012 on Was tempted to post some non UFC fights in that thread from JMMA, BMMA, etc. but opted not to since I'm not sure anyone on here cares about non UFC MMA.

This was a match I had high hopes for since they were going at other for a while in other multi man matches before this and although it didn't live up to my expectations, this was somewhat decent as it had it's moments. Despite not delivering to up to my expectations, this did have a particularly big match feel and a very hot crowd. Naito wasn't particularly great in this, but he did have his moments. Some of his high flying offense is kind of awkward, but he does have a neat high arching suplex and he does know how to throw some hard slaps. I think the biggest knock on this match for me is that I was expecting them to go all out on each other from the get go since they had some decent heated exchanges in the multi man matches leading to this, yet they held back a bit. The finishing stretch was particularly hot though and that top rope brainbuster was amazing. Also that headbutt exchange at the end I thought was thoroughly awesome.

I didn't think this was anything special really. It was your standard Ishii against chubby Japanese wrestler match. Ishii has had these type of matches over the years against other chubby and fat Japanese wrestlers and they’ve been much better. This lacked heat and drama, didn’t particularly keep me engaged and the crowd was pretty much dead for the entire thing except for the last minute or so of the final stretch. I did enjoy Ishii’s brutal headbutts in the final stretch and I also dug the fact that they didn’t go overboard with the big moves and false finishes, but that was about it.

Not particularly a dream match but I think a battle of the Paul Heyman guys between Cesaro vs. Brock could be amazing. I'd really love to see Cesaro face someone who can and will out power and just see how he reacts and tries to one up Brock in that area.

This was another fantastic Cesaro match, however it didn't feel as epic and was a lot more simple than the Cena match. I'd give the Cena match the nod as it felt bigger and they really went all out. This however was more of a TV match where they didn't go all out and kept it a lot more simpler without going over the top with spots and false finishes. Cesaro was on point here hitting all of his usual spots. Orton particularly stepped up his game here bumping all around for Cesaro and letting him go over clean with the huge upset which got a big reaction from the crowd. Despite them keeping it simple, it was a very defining match for Cesaro as it was a clean win over the world champ. Anyway, as good as this was, I'd say I liked this the least of the 3 big Cesaro matches; vs. Cena on RAW and vs. Zayn on NXT. I know this was a lot more different than the Zayn match, but I still prefer that match to this one and that's not a nod as they're still very good matches.

This was an excellent match worked a lot more differently than the Cesaro/Cena. Here Cesaro was a higher ranked power house bully meanwhile in the Cena match he was the lesser ranked power house trying to pull out the upset over the much higherly ranked seasoned veteran. Cesaro's particularly great in both rolls, however here he just excelled in his roll. Zayn isn't particularly great at selling and he blows off all of Cesaro's early legwork which in the long run doesn't really mean much, but he's excellent at playing the underdog and he's also willing to take some crazy bumps and letting Cesaro lay in his brutal European uppercuts and double stomps. Like I said before, Cesaro's particularly great in this as he does a fantastic job playing the higher ranked power house bully beating up Zayn with all kinds of stiff European uppercuts, double stomping on Zayn and pulling out a ton of nasty slams and throws. Plus he's great at catching all of Zayn's high flying offense and most of the countering them with vicious slams and throws such catching a Zayn Arabian press to the floor and countering it into a brutal slam on the ramp. The finishing stretch was particularly hot and got the crowd going wild since it had a bunch of neat contrived spots leading to some close nearfalls. I can understand some complaining that the early legwork was blown off here, but it really doesn't drag down the quality of the finishing stretch that much as they really go all out and pull out a ton of amazing spots they usually don't pull out. Say what you will, but this was a fantastic match and although some may say it wasn't up there with the Cena or Orton matches, but that's still not a knock on this and this is still something I highly recommend since it's a totally different structured match and totally fun to watch.