Wrestler of the Week, Week 6

February 7th – February 13th

5. Jeff Cobb
Cobb raised his profile in a big way this week, debuting on AEW as Chris Jericho’s hired gun and being immediately booked in a match with one of the hottest guys in the business for next week – alongside scoring a win in Ring of Honor over Jay Lethal and Jonathan Gresham

4. Hiromu Takahashi
Hiromu is seemingly out of the gates in 2020 trying to prove he’s every bit Will Ospreay’s equal as the centerpiece of the Junior Heavyweight division, with two straight bangers in title matches – this time with his perennial rival Ryu Lee. He then went on to make official what many had penciled in their calendar after Wrestle Kingdom – a first time ever singles match with faction leader and IWGP Champion, Tetsuya Naito at the Anniversary show on 3/3

3. Nyla Rose
Nyla not only won the AEW Women’s Championship from Riho on Dynamite this week, she did so in a great match that might be the best women’s match in AEW to date, and coming just as Britt Baker is starting to click combines to give a feeling of a revitalized women’s division. Nyla has continued to deliver in major matches and I’m interested in the division with her as champ.

2. Yuma Aoyagi
This week All Japan finalized another part of their evolving main event scene as they continue to use Kento Miyahara and his incredible title reign to elevate all those around him, this time landing on former tag partner Aoyagi. While 2019 was the story of Jake Lee and Naoya Nomura both stepping up to be on that same level as Kento, 2020 started with Aoyagi doing the same. This match wasn’t quite the MOTYC of Kento’s matches with Lee and Nomura, but this wasn’t the time for those matches – this was Aoyagi’s coming out party and with this match as the first building block, I can’t wait to see what Aoyagi delivers down the line

1. Jon Moxley

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Jon Moxley was everywhere this week – he started the week with an incredible brawl with Minoru Suzuki for the IWGP US Championship, where he would retain (against all odds) and then set up a match that should be promo of the year material – Moxley vs. Sabre. (Check out the post match comments where Moxley refers to Sabre as a human udon noodle and Sabre calls him Jonathan, great stuff) He would then fly over to the states to wrestle a shockingly great main event with Santana, before setting up a hot match with Jeff Cobb next week. He’d cap the week off with being announced for OTT’s Scrappermania in March, coming to Europe for the first time since leaving WWE and setting up ANOTHER hot match with David Starr. What an all star list of upcoming opponents for Moxley – and obviously, his AEW Championship match with Chris Jericho is just two weeks away.

Wrestler of the Week, Week 5

Jan 31-Feb 6

5. Rhea Ripley

The last thing Rhea did this week nearly entirely removed her from this list, which was deliver a hokey “we. are. nxt.” line. Especially frustrating as a character like Ripley should feel bigger than a brand, and there’s no reason for her to be friendly with Bianca before their match. That said,I still thought Rhea’s stock continued to rise this week, as she looks to be entering in a program with the linchpin of the women’s division for Wrestlemania, which does a lot to legitimize both her and the NXT Championships as something a Rumble winner would challenge for.

4. Ricochet

Since Paul Heyman took over Raw, it’s been evident that he has three pet projects – Drew McIntyre, Aleister Black, and Ricochet. That continued to come together in the Royal Rumble, as Drew and Ricochet were the chosen two to finally overcome Brock, which – along with Ricochet having an angle with Brock the week before the Rumble – you had to figure was going to pay off in a match down the line, and we took the next step there this week with Ricochet getting the win over two of the most featured guys on Raw this year and setting up a match with Lesnar that should continue his streak of having great matches with smaller guys.

3. Zack Sabre Jr.

Zack not only had a predictably great match with Will Ospreay where, at least in my eyes, Zack clearly looked the star of the match, and in forcing Will to work Zack’s style of match, gave you another compelling side to Ospreay’s game we don’t usually see and kept the match feeling fresh – he also, less predictably, retained the British Heavyweight Title in doing so. The two would go on to be the final two in a fun elimination tag a few nights later, where Ospreay would get a pin on Sabre setting up a rematch next weekend in London, where Will can finally save BritWres.

2. Robbie Eagles

This time period covers 5 matches for Eagles – first, in two nights in Sapporo he steals the show in a pair of undercard tags that deliver at a level higher than you usually see in that spot on a New Japan card, and gets the win over BUSHI with the Ron Miller Special in both matches. He would go on to three nights at Korakuen in similar tags, and while he would drop a fall to Hiromu (who Robbie already has a win over from his return match) on night 1, he’d get another win over DOUKI on night 2 leading tohis challenge, alongside CHAOS stablemates Ishii and Goto, for the NEVER 6-man titles against the LIJ team of BUSHi, EVIL and Shingo. Robbie put up a herculean effort, as he had all 5 nights, in what might be the best NEVER 6 man title match to date, but just falls short to BUSHI with the mist. Robbie managed to stand out in every one of these matches, which is impressive when you’re in with talent like Hiromu, Ryu Lee, Shingo, Ishii and Goto every night, but my God this week has me excited for what Eagles is going to do in 2020.

1. Shingo Takagi

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Still, for every how excited I am about Eagles in 2020, it’s a man on the other side of most of those matches who has me most excited now. Shingo would begin the week by capturing the NEVER Openweight Title from Hirooki Goto in an awesome match, then delivering a promo setting up 4 challengers for his new title, including a confrontation with SHO which brings flashbacks to their BOSJ opening night match last year. It looks like Ishii will be his first challenger, and there’s potentially another match with Goto or even a match with Eagles down the line – plus, I seem to remember Will Ospreay being pretty caught up in that NEVER scene last year – perhaps he might take interest in the Dragon again. How can you not be excited about Shingo’s year with just that list of possibilities?

Wrestler of the Week – Week 4

January 24-30


5. Bianca Belair
I really enjoyed the woman’s Rumble this year, and I think Belair was a big part of why. She looked like a real star in this match, and she’s someone I’ve never been that high on before. Shayna was impressive too but I think Belair’s stock rose the most from that match.

4. Nick Aldis
In two segments on Powerrr this week, Aldis solidified himself as one of the best talkers in modern wrestling. Plenty has been said about how refreshing he is in the champion in studio role, but the sit down backstage interview with Marty is as much of a money promo as you’ll ever see.

3. Daisuke Harada
One of this week’s biggest stories was NOAH being bought by CyberAgent and one direct consequence of that was NOAH’s Global Junior League Finals popping up for free on DDT Universe. Harada would win the League on this show that should have more than the usual amount of eyes on it, but more importantly he did it in two great matches where his performance really stood out, with his selling especially fantastic in the final with Dick Togo, but it’s the Semi-Final with Hajime Ohara that you should seek out if you only have time for one

2. Brock Lesnar
For the first half hour of the Men’s Royal Rumble, Brock did everything that Brock always does well. Looked like a beast, was wildly entertaining, and then when the time came to sell, he sold as well as anybody in wrestling. Brock had a performance this week that will go down as one of the all time single performances, and then it was used perfectly to get over our obvious winner this week.

1. Drew McIntyre
People who don’t pay attention to WWE were saying this Rumble win came from nowhere – and I don’t completely disagree, but keen readers of this feature will remember me featuring Drew just a few weeks ago, as someone who was clearly coming across as one of the bigger deals on Raw, and the fans had started taking to without a face turn necessarily being executed yet. That all manifested on Sunday when Drew not only won the Royal Rumble, but eliminated Brock Lesnar on the way there to make a direct path to a Wrestlemania main event. Drew is the recipient of a mega badass push the likes we’ve not seen in WWE since Roman’s initial push, and if he can connect with the WWE audience the way he did on the indies and in Impact a few years ago, he could potentially make much better use of that push and be a top babyface WWE fans may accept, for a while at least.

Wrestler of the Week – Week 3

January 17-January 23

5. Davey Boy Smith Jr.
I really enjoy MLW’s match making in the past few months, and this Opera Cup highlighted that. Davey Boy had to go through a series of tough guys, in Low Ki and Alex Hammerstone, establishing himself as the big tough guy around, and on the other side of the bracket, his former tag team partner and long time friend Brian Pillman Jr. was a big underdog in his matches with the much more experienced TJ Perkins and Timothy Thatcher, and the two would go on to play those roles to perfection in the tournament final. Davey would pick up the win in a tournament I enjoyed a fair bit, which is good for number 5.
4. Cara Noir
Cara Noir was one of the few bright spots of British Wrestling in 2019 and was scheduled to challenge Eddie Dennis for the Progress Title last Sunday at Chapter 101, the first show of the company’s new era after Jim Smallman’s departure. Instead, the show began with Dennis announcing he was injured (shortly after returning from 6 months on the shelf) and vacating the title. Cara would go on to win the title in a 4 way elimination match that came down to Cara and Ilja Dragunov, his opponent in a trilogy of matches in 2019 that elevated both to this level. Cara becomes the first non-WWE talent to hold the Progress Championship since Mark Haskins in 2016 and it will be interesting to see if this is the beginning of a new direction for Progress. Either way, this is a big step in Cara Noir’s career.
3. Buddy Murphy
The best way an undercard guy can usually get elevated in WWE is by affiliation with a top star, as they immediately are forced to actually remember you exist week to week. Buddy is a great worker and had some of WWE’s best matches last year, so getting into a prominent role like a tag team with Seth, one of WWE’s most valuable acts, should enable him to showcase that which in today’s era can be enough to make you… as close to a star as WWE makes
2. Adam Page
The booking of the Adam Page/Kenny Omega team has been some of the best stuff in AEW, and easily the best stuff since Full Gear. This was obviously just the beginning of the next chapter, and it’s clear for all to see that there is tension in the group, and if AEW can tell this story well (and the evidence so far is that when it comes to the major story beats, they’ve mostly done that) then the long term project that is Adam Page should pay off. The signs are already there as he is coming off as more of a star each week.
1. Keith Lee
Keith Lee is one of WWE’s best successes in recent months, and was probably the person who benefited most out of Survivor Series (at least, on the men’s side). He’s been on a hot streak ever since and capitalized on that momentum winning the North American Championship from Roderick Strong in a predictably great match. You have to wonder if Lee is a guy Vince has any interest in, but I really hope not because he can have fun matches with so much of NXT if he’s about to spend a year or more in prominent Takeover spots.

Wrestler of the Week – Week 2

January 10-January 16

5 – The Grizzled Young Veterans (Zack Gibson and James Drake)
Alex Shelley’s debut in NXT was a pretty cool thing, when you read his Twitter posts about what it means to him. But his first match teaming back together with KUSHIDA was a loss to the Grizzled Young Vets, who got to cut a promo afterwards and show a worldwide audience one what we in the UK have known for a while, that Gibson is one of the best heels in wrestling
4 – Drew Mcintyre
This week’s RAW started with a pretty fun segment, where both AJ Styles and Randy Orton felt like fresh and interesting characters. Then out came Drew, who continued to come off well in his babyface role and then won the triple threat with these two other guys who had been positioned as a big deal on the show. The babyface role is where Drew always should have been and it’s a great sign if they’re running with that in 2020
3 – Tyler Bate
Last year, Tyler Bate wrestled 40 matches, and less than 10 singles matches. He’s already one of the best in the world at such a young age, but in 2020 I need to see him in more matches like the one he had this week at NXT UK Takeover against Jordan Devlin. He came out on top there, despite Devlin seemingly being on the rise, so I expect they have big things planned for Tyler. Plus, he set up a match alongside his Moustache Mountain teammate Trent Seven vs. two of NXT’s top stars in DIY for Worlds Collide.
2 – Tessa Blanchard
It’s possible that considering what she achieved this weekend, we could be viewing Tessa as a slam dunk number 1 this week. She’s the first woman to hold the Impact Wrestling Championship, a title that has been a fairly big deal at some points in recent history, and that’s a big achievement for her and a big step for Impact. Unfortunately her week hasn’t been all good, and a cloud hangs over her title win due to her past behaviour – the same cloud that in many ways has hung over her career to this point.
1 – Marty Scurll
Marty might once again have proven to be the smartest man in wrestling. While his friends went off to live their dream, his name became one of the hottest in wrestling over the past year, with no end to the speculation about his next move. Marty managed to turn that, along with ROH’s desperation to hold on to at least one star, into a lucrative deal for himself – with what is being reported as WWE main roster money for something like 40 dates a year – as well as taking over the head booking position in ROH, which seems to have had the knock on effect of helping to repair the ROH – NJPW relationship, as ROH went on to announce NJPW talent for Wrestlemania Weekend after not seeing any in months. This seems like a great move for both Marty and Ring of Honor

Wrestler of the Week – Week 1

January 3-January 9

5 – Hiromu Takahashi
Returned from a brutal neck injury and 18 months on the shelf, after months of speculation, and looks to have not missed a step. Looking every bit Will Ospreay’s equal, assuring us the Junior division is in good hands for years to come as he prepares to resume his legendary feud with Ryu (aka Dragon) Lee
4 – Go Shiozaki
The biggest story of the week outside of NJPW had to be the roaring success of NOAH, who sold out Korakuen Hall running opposite both nights of Wrestle Kingdom. And main eventing both of those shows, in matches that were said to be tremendous (only the 2nd night has aired so far is my understanding) would have been a feather in Go’s cap regardless. But he shocked the majority of NOAH fans by defeating young ace in grooming, Kaito Kiyomiya for the GHC Heavyweight Title. Looks like NOAH is having one more Go of it, am i right?
3 – KENTA
a year ago KENTA was wrestling Noam Dar and Cedric Alexander in matches nobody was watching, and he’d been long abandoned as a guy with no personality to make it in WWE. This week, the Tokyo Dome main event ended for the first time in a decade with neither Hiroshi Tanahashi or Kazuchika Okada delivering a rousing go home promo – but with KENTA, sat cross-legged across the new champion’s chest, mocking Shibata’s classic pose and drawing some of the biggest heat I’ve ever heard in New Japan. KENTA is going to have a hell of a year, and he already has a hot main event for the double titles coming up in Osaka out of this.
2 – Tetsuya Naito
I waffled on this a little bit, and it’s real close between the top 2. If night 1 hadn’t happened, Naito is a slam dunk number 1 this week. Finally gets his Tokyo Dome headlining victory over Kazuchika Okada, redeeming his losses from 6 years ago (where, for those who don’t know – Naito had won the G1 and challenged Okada for the title, but this was while Nakamura held the IC title and had really elevated that title over his reign, and was defending against Tanahashi who was still incredibly popular in his own right. So NJPW put it to fans to vote on which match main evented – and they put the IC title in the main event, which was seen as a rejection of Naito. It took Naito turning heel and forming LIJ for the audience to embrace him fully, which is how we get to today where Naito is the most popular wrestler in Japan) and 2 years ago, and ends Wrestle Kingdom as the double Heavyweight and IC champions. And he did it in one of the greatest matches I’ve ever seen, amidst pro wrestling storytelling perfection. The only reason he’s not number 1, is that it took two people to have that match, and the other guy had a much better night 1…
1 – Kazuchika Okada
Maybe a lot of people will think of this as Naito’s weekend, and there’s no doubt it’ll be remembered as that for a long time. And, I think there’s a good chance this is going to be Naito’s year. But my clearest takeaway from this past week of wrestling is that when this decade wraps up, Okada is going to be untouchable as the Greatest of all Time barring a tragedy. The man went and banged out 5 stars or as close as it gets on two consecutive nights, drawing 70,000 people to the Tokyo Dome in two days. He’s 32 years old and just hitting his prime. Every one of us who is a wrestling fan today should take pause to be thankful that we are living in the era of Kazuchika Okada. There’ll never be another.

Matches of the Week – May 19th-25th

God. What a week. Surely THIS week won’t be topped for a while… will be the name of this blog going forward. But maybe I’m right this week! This week started with a good WWE PPV, and NXT and UK both delivered quality main events. But alongside that, NJPW’s Best of the Super Juniors continued, and what had already been a good tournament became an all time great one after three amazing nights in Korakuen Hall. And then, at the very end of the week, the long awaited first Pay Per View from All Elite Wrestling, Double Or Nothing, was a perfect way to start off the new promotion.

As has been the case recently, there’s been a few matches that have been on my radar but that I’ve just not made it around to watching for myself – most notably, the Triple Crown Championship match in All Japan between Kento Miyahara and Shuji Ishikawa. My first exposure to modern All Japan was the Champion Carnival this year and Miyahara blew me away so I am really looking forward to checking this one out at some point, but it won’t be making this week’s list!

That said, let’s begin this week’s list…

Honorable Mentions

When this week started, there’s no way I could have expecting AJ Styles vs. Seth Rollins wasn’t making my final list. They had a fantastic match at Money in the Bank that would have made the list almost any other week, one of my favourite WWE PPV matches in a long time. It was briefly on the list instead of #5, but the match that made the cut just did a better job of investing me emotionally. That is what I view as WWE’s big weakness and it did strike again here, despite AJ and Rollins doing tremendous work in the ring.

I also want to give a shout out to the NXT and NXT UK main events this week – both WALTER vs. Pete Dunne and Gargano/Riddle vs. Fish/O’Reilly were fun TV main events that furthered the main event stories of those brands and I think are worth checking out.

5. Cody vs. Dustin, AEW Double Or Nothing (25/5)

When this was announced as Cody’s match for Double or Nothing, I thought this was a stretch too far for Cody in being the “storytelling guy” – after All In’s match with Nick Aldis which over delivered by playing up the story and drama of Cody’s chase for the NWA title his father so famously held, facing Dustin here seemed like going back to the well and I wasn’t excited for it.

Obviously, I’m a huge fucking idiot, because story telling is all that wrestling is and if the dynamic here at AEW is going to be Kenny – modern singles epics, Bucks – modern high action tag matches, Cody – old school storytelling matches then we’re going to have some great cards coming up.

It’s hard to talk about this match and not bring up Dusty – this was as Rhodes a match as you get, right down to that image of Dustin covered in blood that nobody will soon forget. The match is punctuated with tributes to Dusty from both the crowd and the brothers which really highlights the emotional nature of this match, tapping into your emotions in a way a burgeoning promotion doesn’t usually have a chance to. The one piece of lore AEW comes with fully formed, outside of Being the Elite, is the Rhodes legacy, and between this match and the post-match promo setting up the Rhodes Bros vs. Young Bucks, it looks like they intend to play on that some more – and since it’s clearly worked so well on both shows so far, who can blame them?

While the story of this match basically comes down to Dustin’s bloody mask and refusal to go down, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention how damn clean Dustin looked in this match. Contrasting him to Chris Jericho in the main event later only further highlights how great Dustin was in this match – everyone will remember the blood and the drama but don’t sleep on the fact that Dustin Rhodes is still a hell of a professional wrestler.

4. Will Ospreay vs. El Phantasmo, NJPW Best of the Super Juniors Night 7 (22/5)

This BOSJ tour has been an exercise in star making, but maybe none have been as surprising as El Phantasmo. It was clear when he pinned Will Ospreay in his debut match in the company just before the tour kicked off that New Japan saw something in the Canadian with the fake Mexican name living in the UK, but I don’t think anyone predicted him working as tremendously (as a heel!) as he has done, bringing us to the first of three consecutive nights in Korakuen Hall where El P is already enough of a made man to go in there and wrestle Will Ospreay in the main event.

Not only wrestle Will Ospreay, actually, but beat him to remain undefeated and hand Will his first loss of the tournament. And he didn’t get there just from being protected in the booking – although it helped. He more than held up his own end, getting his heel act over with the crowd who are loving hating him, and delivering between the bell more than I’ve ever seen him do on these shores. By the time we got to Korakuen Hall’s main event, there were no questions about El P in that spot.

The story, besides the points at stake, is that Ospreay was El P’s friend in England who helped him settle in there when he was fresh from Canada, and he feels betrayed by El P showing up in the Bullet Club. This match wasted no time in getting to the action, with Ospreay attacking El P as soon as the bell rung and taking him to the outside. A couple of minutes in we have El P moonsaulting off the balcony as seen above, and from there begins the ever escalating story of these two doing insane shit to each other, all while El P continues to establish himself as the cocky shit you don’t want to win.

By the closing stretch the Korakuen crowd is in a frenzy for Ospreay, but when El P is up for the Stormbreaker, he takes out Red Shoes, hits a low blow, and from there hits a series of big moves to finally put Ospreay away. There was no doubt by the end of this that El Phantasmo is a star in New Japan Pro Wrestling, and can hang with the very best in the world in a top notch main event spot.

3. Lucha Bros vs. The Young Bucks (AEW Double or Nothing)

How could I talk about this one and not include a bunch of GIFs? This was a spectacular tag team match just as you’ve come to expect from both of these teams, who went out there in front of a rabid crowd and set them alight for 25 minutes and showed a big audience what tag team wrestling can be, and it was perfectly contrasted with the matches either side of it which isn’t a luxury the Bucks have always had.

When the Bucks wrestled at All In, their time was cut short and while that match was wild, it left you wanting more. This match if anything went a little long, and I would probably be even higher on this match if it ended a couple minutes earlier, but it still stands as a phenomenal, balls to the wall action tag team match.

The highlights of the match were the Bucks paying homage to their great rivals of the most notably the El Generico turnbuckle brainbuster and the Motor City Machine Guns’ Made in Detroit, this match was just a tribute to PWG on a worldwide stage and you’ll get no complaints from me about that.

2. Shingo Takagi vs. Dragon Lee, NJPW Best of the Super Juniors Night 8 (23/5)

This GIF was only one exchange but it serves as a perfect microcosm of the match – especially when you take into account the 1 count kick out that followed. Dragon Lee threw everything at Shingo, but he just can’t take him down. That’s a story we’re going to see a lot with Shingo, as he continues to tear through the Junior division for a while. Shingo is the man in New Japan right now, never being pinned or submitted since debuting last October and that is becoming the story of his matches – how do you beat Shingo?

Dragon Lee was absolutely sensational in this match, which you have to be to hold your own with Shingo. Dragon Lee is one of the most amazing wrestlers to see on offense, and it was never captured better than in the final stretch of this match. He brings every style of offense to Shingo, but at the end of the day Shingo is just too strong, too dominant.

I got to show a friend this match who only sees wrestling outside of WWE if I show it to him, and his takeaway on Shingo was “he’s so mean!”. Shingo is a master of getting over that character in just a sneer and a few well placed taunts to his opponent, so even though everybody loves Shingo and will say “he should go undefeated forever!”, it was impossible not to be begging Dragon Lee to keep him down by the end of this.

1. Rocky Romero vs. El Phantasmo, NJPW Best of the Super Juniors Night 9 (24/5)

The reason I’m posting this on a Monday this week is I just couldn’t decide between these top 2 on Sunday and decided to watch them over today. It’s so close and they’re such different matches, to the credit of this amazing tournament as I referenced before. But I ended up going with this one because this had me screaming out of my seat for Rocky when I watched it, and that’s the highest praise I can give a wrestling match. Rocky Romero got me to care, which is especially impressive because I’m essentially dead inside. But God, was my blood pumping for this match.

This match isn’t here in a vacuum – it’s great because of two matches that preceded it. First, the Rocky vs. Ospreay match last week, that established Rocky as a plucky underdog who was as good as anybody – but couldn’t quite get it done with Ospreay. Second was the Phantasmo vs. Ospreay match from earlier in this list – establishing El Phantasmo as not only a star and a villain, but an even taller mountain for Rocky to climb in this final Korakuen Hall main event. There’s even the nice wrinkle that if Rocky can get the win, it helps his friend Will get back in block contention.

But while the story going into the match is strong, it’s the story told in the match that got everybody in Korakuen Hall (and me, at home) on their feet and screaming their hearts out for Rocky. He’s every bit as good as Phantasmo here, showing once again that he’s as good a Junior Heavyweight wrestler as there is, but El P keeps getting the upper hand with dirty tactics.

This leads to the end of the match which sees every trick to get people behind Rocky imaginable – from the moment of the 25 minute call there is such an urgency to everything that happens, that the audience is going wild for the low blow, the ref going down, the Eddie Guerrero tribute spot, and as much as all of that served to add heat to Korakuen Hall’s fire, at home nothing fired me up more than Juice Robinson on commentary. Juice was losing his god damn mind for Rocky here, and he brought me right along with him. One of my favourite commentary jobs of all time.

And what made this all the more memorable and rewarding as a viewer, is that Rocky did it. In his first ever singles main event of Korakuen Hall, he went out there, stole the show, and reminded all of us that he’s one of the best to ever do it, and then topped it off with a memorable win, and celebrating with Roppongi 3K and an elated Korakuen crowd. This was pro wrestling at it’s finest. Rocky Romero fucking rules.

Next Week…

We’ve no end in sight of the hot streak of wrestling in recent weeks, as this coming week we have 3 more nights of Best of the Super Juniors, including the A-Block final of Shingo and Ishimori to decide the block on Friday, and then on Saturday we have a show that always delivers high quality wrestling in NXT Takeover, featuring a rematch of Johnny Gargano and Adam Cole’s great title match from Mania weekend, and a Matt Riddle vs. Roderick Strong match that is what I’m most anticipating from the week as we roll into June and Dominion just a few days after. What a time to be a wrestling fan!

Matches of the Week – May 12th-18th

Sunday means it’s my Match of the Week list time! We had the first week of Best of the Super Juniors, the last two nights of Super Strong Style 16, Rev Pro’s Epic Encounter, a hell of an IMPACT main event, and a sub-par week of Network shows. Also, if you’re into it, Bret Hart vs. Tom Magee would technically have been eligible this week! Plus, in content I didn’t even get round to seeing (can you blame me with all of this other stuff?), Dragon Gate’s King of Gate has been rolling on all week. WWE even put on a nice little Mysterio/Cesaro match on Raw! I say it every week but, a fantastic week of wrestling yet again.

That said, here’s my top 5!

5. Jordan Devlin vs Kyle Fletcher (Progress Super Strong Style 16, Night 2)

This was the first quarter final of Super Strong Style 16 this year, and another big part of Kyle Fletcher’s breakout year as a singles star after his widely praised match with Will Ospreay in Fight Club Pro a few months back. Devlin is a bonafide star at this point and he was able to give all of that rub to Fletcher here. This match was set the crowd on fire and had a tremendous finish

4. Will Ospreay vs. Rocky Romero (16/5, NJPW)

Look at these names. How on earth did I ever buy a Rocky pin attempt in this match? Because these two guys are absolute pros. Ospreay is top 5 in the world week in and week out, and Rocky has been this good for 15 years. This had some of the best hope spots for an underdog in recent memory and matches like this that wouldn’t matter in any other circumstance are why tournaments like Best of the Super Juniors are awesome

3. Minoru Suzuki and Zack Sabre Jr. (c) vs. Aussie Open (Revolution Pro Wrestling: Epic Encounter)

Nobody has been pushed harder in Rev Pro in recent years than Suzuki Gun, with Zack and Suzuki holding the titles for nearly 18 months after winning them from none other than Moustache Mountain, and Zack is also the current British Heavyweight Champion (as seen in NJPW). On the other hand, Aussie Open have come so close so many times. This match was that story in a microcosm. Aussie Open were just full of heart and fire and Suzuki Gun would not let them take the titles without a hell of a fight.

2. SHO vs. Shingo Takagi (13/5, NJPW)

I can’t believe this match didn’t end up my number 1. This was the talk of the internet the day after it happened and is definitely a MOTYC – but I just slightly preferred number 1 here. But god, for all the fire and heart I talked about in the tag match, this was all of that to an even greater degree. The story here is Shingo is undefeated since coming to New Japan, and SHO has become his heated rival in all the Roppongi 3K vs. Shingo/BUSHI junior tag title matches, so SHO is more eager than anyone to hand Shingo his first loss. Shingo is a favourite to win the whole BoSJ but if anybody was to stop him going undefeated, his rival SHO seemed as good a candidate as any, and boy did he have me believing in this match. They’re going to have many more matches, and SHO is probably going to lose many more times before he finally gets that win, but even in a loss here SHO’s star was made.

1. David Starr vs. Jordan Devlin (Progress Super Strong Style 16, Night 3)

I went full 5 bananas on this. These are two of the very best on the planet today in a high stakes, high drama match in the Finals of Super Strong Style 16, delivering everything you would want in the action, setting the crowd alight for 20 minutes straight and giving a finish that called back to the excellent Devlin/Fletcher finish I talked about earlier, this was just everything you want in wrestling and if I hadn’t gone 5 stars on it, I would have added a quarter star for the post match promo anyway. This deserves your attention and I might be willing to say Progress deserves your attention again after this.

And with this week wrapped up, a little preview of next week: Tonight we have WWE Money in the Bank which should deliver some good stuff in ring, Best of the Super Juniors continues through the week and then we close this week with Double or Nothing! It’s the best time to be a wrestling fan.