Kaito Kiyomiya

[Grimmas]

Control21:

The “Supernova” of NOAH, Kaito Kiyomiya has made a name for himself in recent years. Seen as the next “ace” of the promotion, Kiyomiya has continued his journey to establish himself as the clear #1 in NOAH. While he hasn’t been entirely successful, his quality of work has improved with each passing year since his debut in 2015. Recently, he has also worked with NJPW more often, adding to the list of opponents and styles he has worked with. The one thing I appreciate the most about Kiyomiya is that he is a very smooth wrestler, similar to SANADA, but has the flair to spice things up when needed. Nine years into his career, I think he has done enough that make his resume worth looking into.

vs Takashi Sugiura (6/9/2019)

vs Kenoh (1/6/2019)

vs Go Shiozaki (1/4/2020)

w/Yoshiki Inamura vs Konosuke Takeshita & Yuki Ueno (6/6/2021)

vs Keiji Muto (7/16/2022)

vs Kenoh (1/1/2023)

vs Kazuchika Okada (2/21/2023)

w/ Hiroshi Tanahashi & Kento Miyahara vs Kazuchika Okada, Kenoh, & Yuma Aoyagi (6/9/2023)

vs Shota Umino (7/21/2023)

[Ma Stump Puller]

I'm fairly high on Kaito. He's a great base for getting good matches out of basically anyone that wrestles him for big-time matches, namely because of his generous selling and ability to accommodate a wide spectrum of styles. My main issues are fairly easy to explain:

1. His strikes are dynamic but not particularly hard-hitting, making it hard for him to seem legit against actual solid hitters

2. His Keiji Muto inspired work sucks (every "mentor Muto" gimmick has been awful all the way back to young Sanada in AJPW when he was green and overpushed) 

3. He tends to overuse particular formulas way past being enjoyable (see his 2018 title run where EVERY match was the same "Kaito gets his ass kicked for 80% of the match, comeback with a couple of moves, cut-off, repeat until finish" bit for bit for two bloody years)

He also has a issue of not really being able to make his own style. His first gimmick was doing Misawa-cosplay without what really made Misawa's tick, how he's doing the same for Muto. His best matches come when someone gets past that barrier and drags out his terrific selling and emoting like in the Yoshinari Ogawa clinics, Kenoh, Muto etc. Kaito is great on a technical basis but needs direction to really have great matches rather than just good.