NJPW G1 Climax 24: Day 3

NJPW G1 Climax 24: Day 3NJPW G1 Climax 24: Day 3

By Big Red Machine
From July 25, 2014
Discussion

NJPW G1 Climax 24: Day 3 (7/25/2014)- Yamagata, Japan

BLOCK A MATCH: Doc Gallows vs. Tomoaki Honma- 5.75/10
The heat started when Honma missed a headbutt. Also, the sky is blue. Then Gallows worked over Honma’s head until Honma made his comeback. After that they started to tell a nice little story with Gallows hitting big move after big move and Honma surprisingly kicking out. It did a great job of getting you behind Honma to set up the roll-up for a false finish. Gallows eventually picks up the win, though, picking up his first points in the tournament.

BLOCK B MATCH: Karl Anderson vs. Lance Archer (w/TAKA Michinoku)- 6.75/10
Anderson worked over Archer’s knee. Archer did AWESOME chokeslams. He needs to leave Suzuki-Gun and become a monster babyface RIGHT NOW! (Actually, K.E.S. leaving Suzuki-Gun would be a good idea, because it would allow them to add a fourth team into the IWGP Heavyweight Tag Title picture in Suzuki & Iizuka).

BLOCK B MATCH: Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Yujiro Takahashi- 5/10

BLOCK A MATCH: Tomohiro Ishii vs. Shelton X Benjamin (w/TAKA Michinoku)- 5.5/10
Ishii didn’t no-sell here, which was good. Shelton picked up another very surprising win.

BLOCK B MATCH: Tetsuya Naito vs. Toru Yano- 4/10
There was a chair shot right in front of the ref. It even busted Naito open. This was not a DQ. Naito was really good here, aside from the part where he, as the babyface, used the referee as a human shield.

BLOCK A MATCH: Katsuyori Shibata vs. Davey Boy Smith Jr. (w/TAKA Michinoku)- 7/10

BLOCK A MATCH: Yuji Nagata vs. Bad Luck Fale- 5.25/10
The people popped HUGE for the big spots, including Nagata hitting the gigantic Fale with an exploder suplex. Unfortunately, they also had a couple of spots that… well… didn’t look so good (think AJ vs. Paige from Battleground, but not quite as extreme). To my untrained eye, most of the fault seems to be on Fale for being large and not quite as agile as necessary.

BLOCK B MATCH: Hirooki Goto vs. Minoru Suzuki (w/TAKA Michinoku)- 5.75/10
Props to all three guys for actually making sure the ref was distracted before doing a weapon shot. It made it all the more sweet when TAKA finally got what he deserved for helping Suzuki-Gun cheat in so many matches. Suzuki worked over Goto’s head. Goto won with the Goto Shiki, which is the coolest roll-up ever.

BLOCK A MATCH: Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Satoshi Kojima- 7.5/10

BLOCK B MATCH: Togi Makabe vs. Kazuchika Okada (w/Gedo)- 7.5/10
They continued the on-going story of people working over Makabe’s recently-healed jaw. Okada was being a huge dick about it in the beginning, too. This is the first time he has done something overtly heelish in what must be at least a year.
One spot they did that I really didn’t like was when Makabe was on his knees and did the “come on! Hit me with your best shot!” spot. If your jaw is hurting that much, DON’T GIVE THE OTHER GUY A FREE SHOT AT YOUR FACE!
I will never not mark out for Makabe’s spider suplex. The match was great, although I was expecting more both because this was the main event and because of their awesome matches from last summer.

Another decent G1 show from New Japan. I would like to see more out of some of the big stars in these matches, and I had hoped that the extra breaks between shows and having one show off would allow the wrestlers to go a bit harder than they would with a schedule like last year’s where they did nine shows in eleven days, but it seems like that has not been happening. The wrestling is still almost always good to great but I was hoping for a few more matches to be more than that (along the lines of AJ vs. Okada from night one).

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