NJPW G1 Climax 30 10.16

Gabriel Kidd vs. Yota Tsuji - 6/10

Usual good stuff. Tsuji won.

G1 Climax 30 Block A Match
Yujiro Takahashi (0) vs. Jeff Cobb (8) - 6/10

Yujiro finally got a win so he wouldn't go home with zero points. This wasn't particularly good, Cobb sold a lot, and while I liked his selling for the most part, it was against Yujiro and it just felt forced at this point. The positives about the match were that towards the end, after the cane shot, there was a spot that made it seem like Cobb was winning, only to get taken down by Yujiro's Pimp Juice. If anything else, the match lasted what it had to.

G1 Climax 30 Block A Match
Minoru Suzuki (6) vs. Shingo Takagi (6) - 8/10

Good stuff, not like the Summer Struggle match, but great overall. The easy reason is because they didn't get the time they got for the title match and thus, they cut short a lot of the action building for the sake of action here.

The story here was that Suzuki took out Shingo's Lariating arm, and so Shingo had to either fight through the pain, or use the left arm for all his moves, and so sacrificed doing more damage for the sake of not injuring himself further. As the match went on, Shingo started hitting more moves, chasing finishers while Suzuki was still flipping between the Rear Naked and going for the GSP. So at the end, Shingo once again escaped the choke, hit the Last of the Dragons and won.

You could tell that Shingo was getting his win back and likely setting up a NEVER title rematch soon.

G1 Climax 30 Block A Match
Kazuchika Okada (12) vs. Will Ospreay (10) - 8/10

WELL, this was a bit of a big deal. I had been calling out Ospreay for his cockiness because it was obvious that it was a slight gimmick change that stardom (no pun intended) and size had gotten to his head, seed were planted in his promos and the Ishii match. I wasn't expecting to everything explode so soon though, and sure as hell was not expecting Bea Priestley and Tomoyuki Oka to back him up.

The match itself made some sense knowing that Ospreay had a really hard road to the finals and beating Okada was just but the first bump on that road. Match started with Ospreay going all out trying to take out Okada as fast as possible, but Okada survived the onslaught, came back, and started to regain a control he'd naturally have over Ospreay. As the match went on, Okada started locking the Money Clip more and more and eventually, he got Ospreay down in the middle of the ring, but then suddenly, Bea Priestley came down to ringside. Originally, it seemed like a supporting girlfriend pushing for Ospreay to fight til the end, but then she decided to jump the ropes, and among the commotion, a familiar face snuck behind Okada, hit a Claw Chokeslam, leaving Ospreay 100% bewildered. Ospreay realized that he had the opening to hit Stormbreaker and win, and he did. They worked at 100mph and it was great, just awesome transitions and counters.

Post-match - Ospreay is still acting surprised at what just happened, but it doesn't take long for him to finally turn, hit the Hidden Blade on Okada, shout at him that Okada had been holding him down and that he was as good as him, and leave with Bea and Oka.

Hell of an angle. At this point I don't know if this means that Ospreay is leaving CHAOS, but it is likely, and he already has someone with him. In that same vein, we know that White and EVIL are currently in a power struggle, and that Taichi and Suzuki planted some seed early in the G1. Air smells like a shake up is coming in a way for another.

This also opens a door that I don't know what will happened, and that is the the presence of a STARDOM talent in NJPW. Probably nothing. Probably.

G1 Climax 30 Block A Match
Taichi (8) vs. Kota Ibushi (12) - 8.5/10

This was great, they challenged each other to see who could kick the hardest and that's what they did, they kicked each other until neither could stand. Fantastic selling and fire from both men, I personally loved it when Taichi turned his patented 'taking pants off' spot and turned it into a fighting spirit roar. Finish just saw Ibushi capitalize with the Kamigoye after a kick that left Taichi open. The beauty in simplicity.

Ibushi eliminates Ospreay from contingency at this point.

G1 Climax 30 Block A Match
Tomohiro Ishii (6) vs. Jay White (12) - 9/10

Fantastic match, it played with our feelings and knew how to do it. Up to here, Okada and Ospreay have been eliminated, White only needed to win to advance to the finals, especially now that Ibushi won his match and has reached 14 points.

Now, a lot of things had been teasing at White being the finalist for block A. Not only the current tease of White vs EVIL, but the fact that Ibushi had been in the last two finals, winning one of them also added some thoughts that he was likely to win. So we come into the match for the most part expecting a White win, and for about half of the match, it really seemed that way, White just took down Ishii and worked over him for a long while.

Ishii then slowly started to make a comeback, fight through the pain, survive Gedo's interference, and at the end, it a crazy exchange of counters between the Bladerunner and the Brainbuster, but through all the cheating, Ishii managed to drop White with some lariats, hit the Brainbuster, and win.

Post-match - More fuel to the fire, both White and Gedo are seriously and understandably pissed off, but while White is just sulking in the corner, Gedo is all over the place screaming at Red Shoes, at the Young Lions, and....at White. After the Yujiro match, White has some doubts on Gedo, and with this, could Gedo start to see weakness in backing up White?

White called it backstage, he told EVIL that maybe tomorrow, he will have the chance to do what he wasn't able to do today. White costing EVIL the match tomorrow wouldn't surprise me a single bit, but then Naito would need to win the block.

OVERALL THOUGTHS

Masterful booking from all corners. The Ospreay angle was fantastic and how they played out Ibushi's win through White's match, just a great show.