I had a feeling that Taue was going to lose to Marafuji. I wonder if that means that Marafuji is going to get a title shot at Akiyama to give him another quality defense?

Also, it's pretty sweet to see Kobashi beat KENTA with the Wrist Clutch Burning Hammer.......their making it look pretty damn hard to put down KENTA.

This has me thinking, are they FINALLY putting some stock into KENTA/Marafuji as main event talent? If so this is actually a pretty historic moment for NOAH and japanese wrestling in general...............if they are moving juniors up into main event positions. Hell, New Japan has only done this a couple of times (once with Liger, but they squashed him and Fujinami.............but he should have been main eventing anyway back then).

The Zero1MAX guys won the GHC Jr. Tag Belts? That's fucking awesome. And yeah, Kobashi/KENTA sounds awesome.

Whats a wrist-clutch version of a move, as opposed to a normal one?

Ever see an exploder suplex? If so, it's the same except that they clutch the wrist (kind of like how they do in a pumphandle slam).

I know what an Exploder is, but not quite getting the "kind of like a pumphandle" part of it.

Well, you know how when someone does a pumphandle slam they hook the arm in between the legs by grabbing into the wrist? That's what they do here as well.



Like this but with the move starting out with the guy suplexing grabbing the guys wrist and hooking it in between the legs.

From my tarding days, I can tell you that a miss-timed wrist clutch exploder can be hell on the balls...

You're preaching to the choir. Same thing goes for a mistimed fallaway slam. I almost broke my face trying that one.

Ah, I get it now. Somehow I was trying to figure out how you could wrist-clutch the OTHER arm in a pumphandle. But yes, now I see it.

Jesus, a wrist-clutch Burning Hammer? That doesn't even seem nice.

Wrist Clutch Burning Hammer = anyone's ultimate demise

So, I just watched KENTA v Kobashi via youtube.

Wow. I liked that...alot. Easily the best match I've seen this year. I loved all the intricate little peices of storytelling with the certain missed moves over and over. Kobashi constantly looking for that spinning back-chop (help me) and KENTA seemingly always being one step ahead. They just teased and teased beautifully, and had me on a fuckin string the whole way. I loved it.

And just finished Minoru Suzuki v Jun Akiyama from the same show.

A different match, with a very slow and methodical build. Some great spots though, such as Minoru locking in the Octopus on the top. The slap fight was fucking BRUTAL, and I couldn't beleive they just kept going. Finish was a bit out of nowhere, but was nasty enough that I didn't even care.

Liked Kobashi/KENTA more though.

And I'll now add Marufuji/Taue to the list as well, from the same show.

Loved the start of this, really playing little-big well. The middle they kind of lost me for a second, and I was drifting, but then, HOLY SHIT! did they bring it home. The last 1/3 of that match was so hot and awesome, with some great counters. The finishing spot was one of those that is usually great in spirit, and then poor in execution, but they actually pulled it off flawlessly. Really fun match.

Glad you're getting into more and more Puro. NOAH's definately the best place to start for recent stuff. I've yet to see this yet, but it's in the mail.

yeah, I'd like to get this show myself. Looks like it was a pretty damn good show. Also glad to see you are getting into some Puro stuff too. You may also want to check out some early 80's through the 90's All Japan stuff too. If you like guys like Kobashi now, you should have seen them years ago. Shit like that will blow your wrestling mind.