I watched a little more Dynamite Kid in Japan last night. DK vs. Tatsumi Fujinami. A very nice match, but I thought the ending was kind of out of nowhere and abrupt. One thing I love in the match though is this cocky little walk DK does twice. Once, he is bouncing off the ropes and Fujinami is going for a dropkick. Instead of hitting the ropes and running off, DK hits them, stops, and does this cocky little walk off to the side, leaving Fujinami to dropkick the air and land on his back. Great little heel spot. He does it again outside the ring when TF is running towards the ropes obviously going to dive over. It's one of those times when you think' "Why doesn't the guy just walk away instead of standing there to catch his opponent?" Well, this time DK does just walk away and TF lands on his head. I don't know, there's just something so cool about it.

I been watching the Road Warriors DVD. The actual documentary is awesome, but the matches range from kick ass to awful. The matches actually make me realize how much I miss Tully Blanchard, Arn Anderson, Bobby Eaton, and Ted DiBiase as opposed to how much I miss Hawk.

The match with Money Inc. didn't make me miss Dibiase. It was one of their worst non-Bushwackers matches in the WWF (Money Inc., not LOD). Other than that, I agree. :D

The match wasn't that great (although I enjoyed it). But DiBiase himself is just the man. He bumps like a madman even though he's at the end of his career here and quite big, and the evil laugh is just awesome.

Watching Kobashi/Joe. Someone needs to tell the fans that you don't start chanting "this is awesome" during the first minute of the match.

Final Verdict on the match: ***1/2

It was solid but nothing too special. The crowd really detracted from the whole thing by trying to make it sound epic when it really wasn't. It might win MOTY but it shouldn't be anywhere on the radar. Matches off the top of my head that were better this year:

AJ Styles/Kid Kash - Impact in March
Angle/Michaels - WM21
Michaels/Benjamin
AMW/Team Canada - Final Resolution
Joe/Daniels/Styles
Cena/JBL - street fight
Benoit/Regal - Velocity
London/Akio - take your pick
Misterio/Guerrero - Smackdown
Styles/Abyss - Lockdown
Joe/Styles - X Cup Final
Joe/Daniels/Shelley vs. Styles/Dutt/Aries
Spanky/Shelley

You can't tell me you weren't thinking the same thing when Joe slapped the taste out of Kobashi's mouth...

Maybe it was just me in my "mark zone", but the crowd really made the match I thought.

Imagine it in Jersey or somewhere other than NYC, and I bet the match wouldn't have been as good, just because of the crowd.

Maybe I've been watching too much TNA or something, but the fans during Kobashi/Joe didn't seem THAT bad.

I liked that. But my problem with the match was I was waiting for them to get away from the chops and start going for more moves. That never really developed well. I thought the pacing was kind of off as well. They would go from 100 mph to 10 in seconds.

I think the crowd hurt it. They really needed to just get behind Kobashi and stay there.

Are you saying they weren't? I was there live and I've seen it on tape, and while Joe wasn't being actively booed, the reaction for Kobashi doing anything was WAY more than anything Joe did. Even the Muscle Buster. I guess I see your point tho.

This is my MOTY by far, the aura of it is just off the charts.

I heard the crowd was being stupid chanting this is awesome during friggin chinlocks 3 minutes into the match. Is this true? If so, why can't fans be truely respectful by sitting on their hands and exploding for near falls like in Japan?

I dunno, I'm not one to hate on any particular groups of fans. I think whatever fans want to chant, they can chant. Whoever they want to boo, they can boo. I'm not about being a stickler to fan decorum. I don't think everyone should have to sit on their hands and only make noise for highspots. I also don't think that people who don't chant or yell are taking away from the experience. You should react however you feel at the given moment.

Of the specific "This is Awesome" chant, I didn't participate in it, but that was proabably because I was too busy attempting to get my hearing back after Kobashi's first chop shattered my eardrums. You have to understand where this was coming from. The ROH fans as far back as 02 have wondered what Joe vs Kobashi would be like, and now it's right in front of them. It's something literally no one thought they would ever see. So they're amped for that, but there's the lingering feeling that this is gonna be more of an exhibition bout, and that Kobashi could be mailing it in cause it's not that important to his career in the grand scheme of things. Then Joe smacks him in the face and proclaims his dominance of this fed, and you realize it's on. Kobashi unleashes a brutal chop and gets emotionally amped, and you realize he's not going to phone it in either. In those 20 seconds, everyone in the building realized we were going to see a war. It had very little to do with the physical moves they did, it was the message they were conveying. And we all marked out and collectively creamed out pants. That's about as beautiful as pro wrestling can get. The oldest of the old school would be proud of that.

Yeah. Whatever. Saying anything is awesome during a resthold a few minutes into the match is the crowd attention whoring, just like with TNA. Chanting just for the hell of it. I'd rather have a silent crowd than annoying fans.

Edit: I'm not bashing the match, just the crowd, incase anyone sees it like that. I hate stupid crowds. Hate hate hate hate hate them. That's 1 reason I can't enjoy TNA as much. The Orlando crowd sucks, even if they are into everything.

Thats fine for you, but hot crowds can make mediocore matches better for some people. And by the way, aren't all chants "just for the hell of it?"

Not 2 minutes into a match during a chinlock.

It's all opinion, I suppose. I just think you should see it and experience everything that was going on before you judge it.

This video made me laugh really hard.

I've seen better Sid promos.

But that was kinda funny.

CM Punk/CW Anderson from the 1st Ann Show

To say I hate this match would be an understatement. It all comes together to make this match suck. Awful announcing and a match with no substance. Marvel at how most of the match is move, lay around for a minute, move, lay around for another minute. I've never liked Anderson and this match further justifies my dislike of him. Big fat dud.

I also hate the whole worked riot they did on this show. Doing their serious voice shit just annoys me when any fed does it.

Yep. That match reached all new levels of sucktitude.

I forgot to mention that I don't even think Anderson had a shoulder on the mat for that.

Just finished Joe/Danielson.

Very disappointed with this. I liked the one the show before but this just didn't click. I kept waiting and waiting for them to kick it into high gear and it never happened. Also note: don't end 2 matches in a row on fluke rollups. I'd give this about **3/4.

I don't think I'm brave enough to sit through Xavier/Paul London tonight. I'll just watch Inoki/Murdoch or Danielson/Gibson from PWG instead.

AJ Styles vs. Paul London vs. Low-Ki

Not going to really comment on the match. It was solid if not totally forgettable. I just wanted to say that Low-Ki's antics have officially worn very thin on me. His lack of selling and the fact that he wrestlers like he weighs 300 lbs. annoy me greatly. I also find there to be little substance to his matches other than his TNA run where he actually was a good seller for whatever reason.

Just to add. With my next RoH purchase I'll have every show through January of 2004.

I thought this is one of the better spotfests I've ever seen that didn't include weapons, but to each their own.

Have you seen heel Ki? I really wasn't high on him as a face either (after I got over the novelty of his kicks), but I find him to be an amazing heel.

Yeah Low Ki's so much better as a heel it's ridiculous. Especially when he's wrestling someone like Jay Lethal or Austin Aries.

I've seen a lot of his recent NOAH stuff, still sick of him.

Fair enough.

Whaddya think of Homicide?

I like him inring, hate his character and fastforward whenever he talks.

I'd like to add that they were insane putting a 35 minute scramble at the end of the 1st Ann. show. That match was like having teeth pulled.

Homicide talking is some of the most unintentionally funny shit ever.

And yea, that Scramble was fucking retarded. I love the rest of the show, but that Scramble blew.

I thought Revenge of the Prophecy was better overall.

Just watched Collyer/Striker and Red/Slim J. Red/Slim J wrapped up everything I hate about indy wrestling into one match. Every move was a variation on something and who the fuck is Slim J to be kicking out of Red's finisher?

Is that from Expect the Unexpected? I thought that was a decent little spotfest too.

Yeah,

my problems with it are Red shouldn't be going 12 minutes with a guy that's completely on the bottom rung of the fed. It's even worse when barely anyone had kicked out of Red's finisher up till that point and you have fucking Slim J doing it. That'd be like Jerrelle Clark kicking out of Chris Sabin's finisher on the next Impact.

Point taken. What did he kick out of? I don't remember.

Red Star Press.

Holy shit that was awesome. The announcer dude just losing it at the end was great.

Oh yea, and didn't he pin him with the Red Spike? Red had so many finishers.

Yeah, I think that's what got the pin.

Red has 500 finishers, but all of them suck because...

1. He looks like a piece of string, and doesn't look strong enough to have enough impact on the move.

2. Anything high flying probably doesn't hurt, since he weighs like 60 pounds.

I understand people don't like spot monkeys, but to be honest, the only finisher of Red's I didn't like was the Red Star Press, because it looked weak. Cool, but weak. I liked the Red Spike and the Infared because they looked fucking swank, and the Code Red looked impactful as all hell. That shoulda been his main finisher.

I never minded the Red Star Press because he was smart enough to follow up a big move with that. As for his others. His top rope move is ok but he showed the dangers of that when he broke Hidaka's face doing it. The powerbomb is cool the first couple of times you see it but he ran out of situations to use it in quickly. As far as RoH goes, the underdog gimmick doesn't work well when you're the same size or bigger than most of the roster.

Though having a million finishers is just a symptom of the ego stroking that goes on at the indy level. It also shows a basic lack of understanding of what a finisher is supposed to mean in a match. It shows why a Bryan Danielson and a Chad Collyer are miles ahead of most in the indy world. They understand the right moment to go for a finisher and only need 1 or 2 to accomplish that. They don't need 7 to cover up the fact that they just throw the move out there.