[2004-05-03-NJPW-Nexess] Bob Sapp vs Shinsuke Nakamura

[Superstar Sleeze]

IWGP Champion Bob Sapp vs Shinsuke Nakamura - NJPW Tokyo Dome 5/3/04

Fantastic match! Totally different than Sasaki match, which you would expect but I don’t want to take for granted. Nakamura’s approach to taking down the Beast was submission technique as opposed to brawling. It was like shoot-style version of David vs Goliath. Stick and move became submit and move. Bob Sapp’s presence and aura is perfect. Shame he vacated the title after this and was never given a main event run somewhere. Dude was money waiting to be printed.

I love how aggressive Nakamura was early. He was the Tasmanian Devil wrestling circles around Sapp taking him down. The problem was Sapp was just too fucking big. So even though his technique was flawless and he was getting takedowns, nothing stuck because Sapp could just raw muscle his way out. He was flinging Nakamura around with biels and hip tosses but Nakamura would just keep coming. Nakamura tries work up to big finishes like the cross-armbreaker or Triangle but Sapp just brute forced out. I thought his lariats have gotten better too. Massive DROPKICK by Sapp! He geared himself up for that sent Nakamura careening out of the ring. He tried to get back in but Sapp lariat him back out. A little king of the Mountain. He gave chase and on the ramp he looked to polish Nakamura off with a powerbomb but got caught in a Triangle. Great sell here as Sapp took an 18 count.

I was watching this on a 1 inch x 1 inch screen so kinda lost what Nakamura did here but he stayed aggressive and was working through some submission combinations. They get into the clinch and SAPP MURDERS NAKAMURA WITH A LARIAT! Me and the announcer lost our shit! Sapp goes to a choke and NAKAMURA BITES HIS WAY OUT OF IT! HELL YEAH!

Sapp hits a piledriver and is charging at Nakamura who clamps on a Guillotine than a DDT. Sapp reverses the full mount because he is a BEAST! His ground & pound looks killer! Head & arm triangle but Nakamura counters to a crossarmbreaker but Sapp picks him up and slams him! POWERBOMB! One count! Boooo! Sapp rocks him with big strikes and second powerbomb finishes him!

Besides the dumb one count bullshit, this match rocked as a shoot style David vs Goliath match. Sapp looked massive DROPKICK, lariat and powerbomb all looked great. Nakamura May have never looked better as a submission Wizard, love how aggressive he was. I wish we got a lengthy Bob Sapp run on top. ****