Cero Reviews DDT King of DDT 2020 Round 3
Posted: Aug 12th, '20, 15:19
DDT King of DDT 2020 Round 3
August 10, 2020
Tokyo, Japan
Keigo Nakamura & Yukio Naya vs. Junretsu (Hideki Okatani & Mizuki Watase) - 4/10
Young boy undercard match, it was nothing special, Nakamura looked good doing springboard Lionsaults. Watase was the one that took the loss, and given his tour, I wonder if him losing so much becomes a story. Naya was terrible as usual.
Four Way Tag Team Match
Danshoku Dino & Seigo Tachibana vs. Kazuki Hirata & Makoto Oishi vs. ALL OUT (Shunma Katsumata & Yuki Ino) vs. Eruption (Saki Akai & Yukio Sakaguchi) - 5.5/10
This is a big plate of things, but it can all be summarized as Hirata and Oishi practiced their dance really really hard and nothing was going to stop them from performing. It all started before the match, when Hirata tried to dance, Dieno started molesting Katsu, Seigo and Saki started doing their thug thing in the corner, Ino did Hakas, and Sakaguchi started beating up Oishi at the rhythm of the music.
The rest of the match was each team having time to do their little thing, but overall, it was a lot of Hirata and Oishi clearing the ring, trying to dance, and getting interrupted again. The end was Sakaguchi beating up both Oishi and Hirata when they tried to dance. Sakaguchi pinned Hirata.
Antonio Honda & Chris Brookes vs. El Lindaman & Nobuhiro Shimatani - 6.5/10
I never realized how fun a team of Lindaman and Nobu can be, but going against tall ass Brookes somewhat slowed down the match. Match played around Anton doing the Gon The Fox schtick, and then Lindaman turning it on him, and both of them using Lindaman's spray to freeze the fox on the spot. Brookes pinned Nobu to win.
DAMNATION (Daisuke Sasaki, Mad Paulie & Soma Takao) vs. DISASTER BOX (HARASHIMA, Naomi Yoshimura & Toru Owashi) - 6.5/10
This match is being contested under Lucha LIbre rules by request of Mad Paulie, yet Owashi was the only one that took it seriously and stared doing some old school lucha moves. For the rest, Paulie and Naomi did a bunch of hoss stuff, HARASHIMA beat the shit out of Sasaki for a bit before becoming babyface in peril, Takao was great as usual. HARASHIMA pinned Mad Paulie with a Shining Wizard.
There was a joke in this match where DAMNATION brought in Hirata and beat him up like if he was the babyface in peril of DB. The referee didn't say anything, if he's not getting offense in, is it really that bad if the offending party decides to make it a handicap match against themselves? Either way, it wasn't until Hirata got a pin attempt that the referee remembered that Hirata wasn't in the match and told him to fuck off.
King Of DDT 2020 Quarter Final Match
T-Hawk vs. Yuki Ueno - 7.5/10
Great match, T-Hawk was on top of his game this match, and Ueno was a great underdog babyface. He worked over Ueno's back from the get go, pushed him to make fiery comebacks, but T-Hawk kept cutiing him off with chops and punches. Ueno at one point did manage to bring down T-Hawk and hit the BME, but Ueno was too hurt to capitalize before T-Hawk made it to the ropes. T-Hawk came back and won with the BT Bomb and the Night Ride.
King Of DDT 2020 Quarter Final Match
Akito vs. Shinya Aoki - 8.5/10
I'm guilty that ever since Aoki joined DDT, I haven't caught many of his higher level matches, I missed the two big HARASHIMA title matches, and given that I've been loving Aoki since he won the Extreme title, I came in with really high hopes for this match.
This was grapplefuck galore, Akito went for the legs since he's been heavy with the Goliath Bird Eater submission, but Aoki, being a competent overall grappler, worked on the arm for his approach, but also the legs every time he was reversing Akito. At the end, Akito locked in the GBE, which Akito kept escaping, so instead, Akito used the leg lock to roll up Aoki into a pin and win. This was fun.
King Of DDT 2020 Quarter Final Match
Minoru Tanaka vs. Tetsuya Endo - 8.5/10
Tanaka was totally dominant here. Match started with Endo having a good speed advantage, but as soon as Tanaka took out his leg and started working on it, he slowed him down that Endo had a lot of trouble getting back in the match. Eventually, all the little offense from Endo pilled up on Tanaka and Endo was able to get him down for the SSP and win. This was Tanaka's best match in the tournament for sure, arguably Endo's, at least the selling.
King Of DDT 2020 Quarter Final Match
Konosuke Takeshita (w/ALL OUT) vs. Kazusada Higuchi (w/ERUPTION) - 8.75/10
I honestly thought that this tournament was Takeshita's, but I'm soo happy that Higuchi won here. Higuchi was a freaking bulldozer in this match, he went through Takeshita like a wall, so in a way, with some resistance, but still demolished him. Match saw Higuchi dominate Takeshita early on, Takeshita made a strong comeback, but Higuchi, as soon as he saw that the match was slipping away, spammed Chokeslams and turned himself into a dart and pretty much hit a Spear with his head for the win.
Post-match - Higuchi told Takeshita that they should do this again.
King of DDT Semifinal Lottery - All four semifinalists came out for the lottery, 4 balls in a box, matching colors wrestle at the semis. We get Endo vs Higuchi, and Akito vs T-Hawk.
T-Hawk cut a short promo saying that he is looking forward to Akito, and then Endo. He said that he is #DAMNHEARTS, but he is more #STRONGHEARTS. Akito said that he's done with Endo, he hopes to fight Higuchi at the finals. Endo said that he'll win the whole thing for Imabayashi. And finally, Higuchi said that he doesn't care who he faces, he'll be done with Endo, and then defeat whoever it is.
OVERALL THOUGHTS
Strong show, the undercard was really fun and tournament delivered. Some heartbreaks in the tourny matches, but they had to happen. 8.23 show looks really strong now.
August 10, 2020
Tokyo, Japan
Keigo Nakamura & Yukio Naya vs. Junretsu (Hideki Okatani & Mizuki Watase) - 4/10
Young boy undercard match, it was nothing special, Nakamura looked good doing springboard Lionsaults. Watase was the one that took the loss, and given his tour, I wonder if him losing so much becomes a story. Naya was terrible as usual.
Four Way Tag Team Match
Danshoku Dino & Seigo Tachibana vs. Kazuki Hirata & Makoto Oishi vs. ALL OUT (Shunma Katsumata & Yuki Ino) vs. Eruption (Saki Akai & Yukio Sakaguchi) - 5.5/10
This is a big plate of things, but it can all be summarized as Hirata and Oishi practiced their dance really really hard and nothing was going to stop them from performing. It all started before the match, when Hirata tried to dance, Dieno started molesting Katsu, Seigo and Saki started doing their thug thing in the corner, Ino did Hakas, and Sakaguchi started beating up Oishi at the rhythm of the music.
The rest of the match was each team having time to do their little thing, but overall, it was a lot of Hirata and Oishi clearing the ring, trying to dance, and getting interrupted again. The end was Sakaguchi beating up both Oishi and Hirata when they tried to dance. Sakaguchi pinned Hirata.
Antonio Honda & Chris Brookes vs. El Lindaman & Nobuhiro Shimatani - 6.5/10
I never realized how fun a team of Lindaman and Nobu can be, but going against tall ass Brookes somewhat slowed down the match. Match played around Anton doing the Gon The Fox schtick, and then Lindaman turning it on him, and both of them using Lindaman's spray to freeze the fox on the spot. Brookes pinned Nobu to win.
DAMNATION (Daisuke Sasaki, Mad Paulie & Soma Takao) vs. DISASTER BOX (HARASHIMA, Naomi Yoshimura & Toru Owashi) - 6.5/10
This match is being contested under Lucha LIbre rules by request of Mad Paulie, yet Owashi was the only one that took it seriously and stared doing some old school lucha moves. For the rest, Paulie and Naomi did a bunch of hoss stuff, HARASHIMA beat the shit out of Sasaki for a bit before becoming babyface in peril, Takao was great as usual. HARASHIMA pinned Mad Paulie with a Shining Wizard.
There was a joke in this match where DAMNATION brought in Hirata and beat him up like if he was the babyface in peril of DB. The referee didn't say anything, if he's not getting offense in, is it really that bad if the offending party decides to make it a handicap match against themselves? Either way, it wasn't until Hirata got a pin attempt that the referee remembered that Hirata wasn't in the match and told him to fuck off.
King Of DDT 2020 Quarter Final Match
T-Hawk vs. Yuki Ueno - 7.5/10
Great match, T-Hawk was on top of his game this match, and Ueno was a great underdog babyface. He worked over Ueno's back from the get go, pushed him to make fiery comebacks, but T-Hawk kept cutiing him off with chops and punches. Ueno at one point did manage to bring down T-Hawk and hit the BME, but Ueno was too hurt to capitalize before T-Hawk made it to the ropes. T-Hawk came back and won with the BT Bomb and the Night Ride.
King Of DDT 2020 Quarter Final Match
Akito vs. Shinya Aoki - 8.5/10
I'm guilty that ever since Aoki joined DDT, I haven't caught many of his higher level matches, I missed the two big HARASHIMA title matches, and given that I've been loving Aoki since he won the Extreme title, I came in with really high hopes for this match.
This was grapplefuck galore, Akito went for the legs since he's been heavy with the Goliath Bird Eater submission, but Aoki, being a competent overall grappler, worked on the arm for his approach, but also the legs every time he was reversing Akito. At the end, Akito locked in the GBE, which Akito kept escaping, so instead, Akito used the leg lock to roll up Aoki into a pin and win. This was fun.
King Of DDT 2020 Quarter Final Match
Minoru Tanaka vs. Tetsuya Endo - 8.5/10
Tanaka was totally dominant here. Match started with Endo having a good speed advantage, but as soon as Tanaka took out his leg and started working on it, he slowed him down that Endo had a lot of trouble getting back in the match. Eventually, all the little offense from Endo pilled up on Tanaka and Endo was able to get him down for the SSP and win. This was Tanaka's best match in the tournament for sure, arguably Endo's, at least the selling.
King Of DDT 2020 Quarter Final Match
Konosuke Takeshita (w/ALL OUT) vs. Kazusada Higuchi (w/ERUPTION) - 8.75/10
I honestly thought that this tournament was Takeshita's, but I'm soo happy that Higuchi won here. Higuchi was a freaking bulldozer in this match, he went through Takeshita like a wall, so in a way, with some resistance, but still demolished him. Match saw Higuchi dominate Takeshita early on, Takeshita made a strong comeback, but Higuchi, as soon as he saw that the match was slipping away, spammed Chokeslams and turned himself into a dart and pretty much hit a Spear with his head for the win.
Post-match - Higuchi told Takeshita that they should do this again.
King of DDT Semifinal Lottery - All four semifinalists came out for the lottery, 4 balls in a box, matching colors wrestle at the semis. We get Endo vs Higuchi, and Akito vs T-Hawk.
T-Hawk cut a short promo saying that he is looking forward to Akito, and then Endo. He said that he is #DAMNHEARTS, but he is more #STRONGHEARTS. Akito said that he's done with Endo, he hopes to fight Higuchi at the finals. Endo said that he'll win the whole thing for Imabayashi. And finally, Higuchi said that he doesn't care who he faces, he'll be done with Endo, and then defeat whoever it is.
OVERALL THOUGHTS
Strong show, the undercard was really fun and tournament delivered. Some heartbreaks in the tourny matches, but they had to happen. 8.23 show looks really strong now.