NJPW G1 Climax 25: Day 17

NJPW G1 Climax 25: Day 17NJPW G1 Climax 25: Day 17

By Big Red Machine
From August 14, 2015
Discussion

NJPW G1 Climax 25: Day 17 (8/14/2015)- Tokyo, Japan

MASCARA DORADA, TOMOAKI HONMA, & SATOSHI KOJIMA vs. BULLET CLUB (Karl Anderson, Yujiro Takahashi, & Tama Tonga)- 6/10
Fun opener, particularly for Dorada’s high-flying. Bullet Club beat Honma up a bit after the match.

MICHAEL ELGIN & reDRagon vs. BULLET CLUB (Cody Hall & the Young Bucks)- 6.75/10
Really fun match with a lot of food action.

KUSHIDA, MANABU NAKANISHI, & YUJI NAGATA vs. HIROOKI GOTO, CAPTAIN NEW JAPAN, & RICOCHET- 5.75/10

SHINSUKE NAKAMURA, YOSHI-HASHI, KAZUSHI SAKURABA, & TOMOHIRO ISHII vs. KAZUCHIKA OKADA, GEDO, MATT TAVEN, & MICHAEL BENNETT (w/Maria Kanellis)- 6/10

G1 CLIMAX 25 BLOCK A MATCH: Katsuyori Shibata vs. Doc Gallows- 7/10
They had a surprising number of really great false finishes for a match that was as short as this one was.

G1 CLIMAX 25 BLOCK A MATCH: Toru Yano vs. Bad Luck Fale (w/Tama Tonga)- DUD!
With the first thirty seconds of the match, Yano kicked the middle rope into Fale’s groin, sprayed him in the face with something, and hit him in the back of the head with a weapon, all right in front of the referee. There was no DQ for any of this.
Fale beat Yano up for a bit (including a weapon shot of his own which was not a DQ for some reason) until Yano hit Fale with a low blow (which was also not a DQ) and snuck back into the ring for a count-out win in under four minutes. Yano had about five offensive maneuvers the whole match and not a single one of them was legal.
Maybe the count-out would have worked earlier in the tournament, but there is really no good reason for Yano to win here, and giving Fale the win would set up for a better story between him and AJ whenever they decide to pull the trigger on that because the difference between them would have the points that AJ got by cheating Fale in their match against each other.

G1 CLIMAX 25 BLOCK A MATCH: Tetsuya Naito vs. Hiroyoshi Tenzan- 6.75/10
That spot where Tenzan busted out of the Koji Clutch with those headbutts was awesome. BAFFLING booking on the finish, though. Why the hell would you have Tenzan win here?

G1 CLIMAX 25 BLOCK A MATCH: Kota Ibushi vs. Togi Makabe- 6.75/10
Kota works the knee and gets the win.

G1 CLIMAX 25 BLOCK A MATCH: AJ Styles vs Hiroshi Tanahashi- 8.5/10
They told a good story with both guys working the leg and had some really cool spots as well. I’m not sure how much I liked them kicking out of the big finishers (even if it was the other guy hitting the move), and I thought that whole ref bump just for the sake of doing low blows was pretty bad.

I actually like Tanahashi picking up the win here as it allows them to save the first-time-ever AJ vs. Nakamura showdown for a bigger stage with more build (like maybe Invasion Attack, or even the 2017 January 4 Tokyo Dome show) while still giving us an epic match in Nakamura vs. Tanahashi which we haven’t seen in almost a year and a half now (assuming Nakamura actually wins his block, of course)




A good show from New Japan, with the awesome main event more than making up for the earlier dud.

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