NOAH Great Voyage in Yokohama

Pro-Wrestling NOAH
Great Voyage in Yokohama
12th October 2014, Cultural Gymnasium, Yokohama

After the relative stinker in Niigata, NOAH played their cards immediately correctly by announcing a hip and relevant main-event and a slew of major title bouts for the Yokohama supercard (here) and a very attractive line-up for the Global League (coming soon).

Your main event

These larger NOAH events seem to do quite well at the gate too, attracting a reported 3500 for this particular show. Admittedly New Japan dragged an extra 2000 bodies into the same building but let's not be churlish - NOAH still has some sex appeal remaining, even if it seems to have a kind of funereal tone in parts.

Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Hitoshi Kumano vs. Mitsuhiro Kitamiya

I have a lot of time for all three guys. Sadly, NOAH don't on this evening, sending them out in a four minute match. The two dojo guys, Kumano and Kitamiya, run to the ring, compressing this entire segment into a Sabre Jr. entrance, a few smart roll-ups and a Jim Breaks-style armbar on Kumano to finish by Sabre Jr. Originally this was supposed to be a tag match featuring Yoshinari Ogawa, but he was injured. ** 

Sabre Jr. d. Kumano and Kitamiya

Akitoshi Saito and Genba Hirayanagi (No Mercy) vs. Pesadilla and Quiet Storm

Not a great deal to say here either. This (and the next two matches) are 'Passage to Global League' matches, highlighting some people who will take part in the upcoming round-robin tournament. Quiet Storm, who huffs and puffs like a pack of fairytale wolves whether promoing, entering or working, takes the win over Genba with his '50cm Lariat' (a lariat with a humblebrag about his bicep size).

@fujiwaraarmbar @TJHawke411 If his name was Angry Beefcake you'd probably appreciate him more.
— Arnold Furious (@ArnoldFurious) October 24, 2014

There's not much chemistry here and it really feels quite thrown together. Saito is quite a lumbering character who can lumber his way to a decent match with the right opponent. Hirayanagi has inherited the No Mercy leadership from KENTA and performs his duties with a rabble-rousing promo, but it's all for nought. **

Storm and Pesadilla d. No Mercy

Maybach Taniguchi and Takeshi Morishima (Cho Kibou-gun) vs. TenCozy (Hiroyoshi Tenzan and Satoshi Kojima)

Despite being the king dick heels in NOAH for quite some time now, the Cho Kibou-gun pair are not the heels in a match against two of the most storied and gloried wrestlers working in Japan today. Part of me likes the defensiveness of the NOAH fan, part of me hates that TenCozy get booed against these particular dicks because my god they are DICKS.

And I promise I am not some gigantic NJPW mark that automatically categorises everything that TenCozy does is brilliant and everything that CKG does is lamentable but pretty much everything here that attempts to cohere and prod the crowd into reacting comes from Tenzan and Kojima and everything that tries to break the match apart into a clumsy shitbrawl is Morishima and mainly Taniguchi. The ending is Taniguchi using his big forked metal pole on Kojima for about 30 seconds until the referee calls for the bell and puts us all out of our misery. **1/4

TenCozy d. Cho Kibou-gun

Mohammed Yone and Katsuhiko Nakajima (BRAVE) vs. Yuji Nagata and Manabu Nakanishi

The crowd boo Nagata too but that's ok; Nagata has recent history fighting as an invader heel champion figure and whilst booing Nakanishi seems absolutely ridiculous considering the absurd beauty of the manbeast, it is entirely congruent here. Nagata also won last year's Global League and successfully defended his GHC Championship against Yone, so this match heralds a return to the scene of glory.

Can't stop singing 'Nakajima' to the theme of 'Macarena'

No disrespect to anyone wrestling below this match on the card, but their efforts are diminished and forgotten when Nakajima and Nagata start laying waste to one another with their signature stinging kicks. Whilst the match isn't always graceful and smooth, it is keenly-contested in all quarters, with the kind of pink-knuckled fury you want to see in the first half closing position.

Nagata picks up the win for Team NJPW with a Backdrop Hold on his old foe Yone. In the post-match, Nagata claims that he will defeat Yone again during the Global League on the final day and go onto defend his victory. Fun match that was held back a little by its self-nominating as a 'passage' match but enhanced by four guys who all bring something different that interlocks well. ***1/4

Nagata and Nakanishi d. Nakajima and Yone

GHC JUNIOR HEAVYWEIGHT TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP
Atsushi Kotoge and Taiji Ishimori (BRAVE) (c) vs. Hajime Ohara and Kenou (Cho Kibou-gun) 

In a dance as old as time itself, the winners of the recent tournament (Ohara and Kenou) take on the champions. Until that tournament, the heel pair were something of the luckless victims of their own scourge, with either man failing to capture the singles titles or score a great deal of meaningful clean victories. Often their roles were strictly consigned to 'doing the job for Cho Kibou-gun'. Of a fairly unlikable stable they're arguably my favourites; Kenou plays straight down the line dick, where Ohara seems more reluctant to be mean because he's got all these legit shooter credentials to rely on.

Ohara and Kenou

In the opposite corner are two stalwarts of a fun babyface stable comprising of mainly likeable cool and tough guys who always seem to triumph come the allotted hour. Both are also tremendous wrestlers who probably work better as singles, but are plugging a gap quite well here. It's a solid dynamic that allows this match the chance to go places

NOAH don't work the same style as NJPW and Dragon Gate so even in their junior tag matches you won't see the same degree of twisty turny flippy speedy all over the ring stuff. If you're the kind of Bill Watts-esque figure who believes that the marquee says wrestling and this ain't no goddamn trampoline act then you might enjoy this more. Me? There's room for a bit of everything isn't there?

Ishimori injured his leg (SHOOT) and that is the focus of their opponents, larruping him mercilessly in a match, like all seeming to involve Kenou, that gets going and halts and gets going again and halts ad infinitum. The champions bravely endure the onslaught but can't avoid the end where Ohara applied the Muy Bien Special to the knackered leg of Ishimori to add the titles to their tournament win. Maybe the corner has been turned? ***1/4

Cho Kibou-gun d. BRAVE to become new GHC Jr. Heavyweight Tag Team Champions.

GHC JUNIOR HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP
Daisuke Harada vs. Super Crazy

An interesting assignment for Harada. Not least because Super Crazy doesn't seem eligible for a tilt at a weight-limit title, but because in my mind Super Crazy was relatively old when he was delighting me in ECW in the late 90s with his flips and dives and twirls all performed with a huge grin on his face.

Super Crazy, definitely not this decade

Age may have not done kindnesses to his gravity but Crazy can still work a legitimately decent 15 minute match with an accomplished grappler like Daisuke Harada. In fact, for all his superlative skills, Harada is relatively dry, the teetotal pro golfer compared to Super Crazy's swigging and smashing John Daly. It gives a nice character mirror where there's no real bad guy, just whichever one you prefer.

The match reminds me of Dean Malenko trying to work WWE main event style circa 2004. The pair wind up near the stage for a planned moonsault spot by Crazy, which Harada gamely complies with. In fact, most of the running was done by Crazy, who kept the pace lively and arguably showed his opponent a thing or two about maintaining relevance and keeping a crowd alive.

Harada is a canny champ, and despite a late onslaught from Crazy's attempted trio of moonsaults (first and second turnbuckle hit, top turnbuckle missed), Harada hits his death device, the Katayama German Suplex Hold, and makes his fifth successful defence. Super Crazy is respectful in defeat. Zack Sabre Jr. is marginally less respectful, coming out to challenge for the belt in Japanese, to which Harada accepts and FINALLY THE DREAM MATCH IS MADE. ***1/2

Harada d. Super Crazy

GHC TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP
Dangan Yankees (Masato Tanaka and Takashi Sugiura) (c) vs. The Mighty Don't Kneel (Shane Haste and Mikey Nicholls)

This quartet had a fantastic outing on the second Great Voyage show in Tokyo that began with the same champs. On that occasion TMDK vowed to go away and sharpen up their skills and come back to take the titles away. Sadly that doesn't occur. They lose once again.

Now that the result and backstory is out of the way, let me briefly tell you about this match and these guys. I really rate the lot of them and it is a pleasure to see them all just doing their stuff. The Young Bucks may have the creative edge on the tag team of the year debate, but there's something about the Dangans solemn brutality that wins me over stronger. They're veterans having the time of their life, not simply rehashing their multiple glories, but adding new pages to their annals of awesomeness.

And it's so cool to see TMDK hang with this as younger guys and foreigners (who can sometimes seem a bit 'meat in the room' at Japanese events) who are really carving out a niche for themselves. Previously I'd thought Haste was a lock for future fame, but Nicholls is impressive as hell here. Every pairing going toe-to-toe just works incredibly well and I'm going to struggle to say a bad word.

Of course it wasn't perfect, but it was brawny and brave and brutal. Sugiura takes the win for the champions with the Olympic (Qualifying) Slam on Nicholls. There are more handshakes. There is respect. Nobody hams it up for too long. THANK YOU. THANK YOU. THANK YOU. ****

Dangan Yankees d. TMDK

GHC HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP
Naomichi Marufuji (c) vs. Daisuke Sekimoto

Marufuji's GHC matches in 2014 kind of, from a certain cynical remove, look like a tickbox exercise. First the invader. Then the young friend. Then the mean big former champ. Then his big cheaty friend. And now: the hipster choice, the relevant beast, the strong and the agile, the bingo hall bruiser Daisuke Sekimoto.

COUNTDOWN TO SEKIMOTO WINNING GHC HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPIONSHIP - 16 days pic.twitter.com/ucc4R0kjKI
— fujiwara armbar (@fujiwaraarmbar) September 26, 2014

And as much as I love the hell out of Sekimoto there isn't much storyline rationale for his appearance here other than to provide another credible guy for Marufuji to down. Sekimoto has kind of padded his way through his rare NOAH appearances, defeating Taniguchi by DQ (I think even my dad has a DQ win over Taniguchi) and scoring one pinfall on a small show very late in the day in a match featuring Marufuji. Fine. Whatever it takes to get this guy the spotlight.

The crowd, admittedly in the backyard of Sekimoto's home of Big Japan, are right into the challenger's array of dismissive throws and strength manoeuvres. Marufuji attempts the apron Shiranui but Sekimoto shugs Marufuji off, backdropping the champion to the floor for the first big UHHHHHH of the night. They have remain relatively subdued all night but that is NOAH and I'm increasingly learning to discount them as they seem to confuse enjoyable fun pro-wrestling with a funeral for a guy who died 5 years ago.

Sekimoto overpowers Marufuji

When the match picks up it's great; Sekimoto hits his Delayed German Suplex, a real thing of wrestling beauty, a brutal move in slow motion and befitting of a guy in this position. The problem is you never, despite my joke-heralding of Sekimoto as the new champ, believe that Sekimoto is going to to win. And so it proves. And as a mild dampener to the beastliness of Sekimoto, the win comes sort of out of nothing, with Marufuji winning with a kind Boma Ye variation after not a great deal of offence.

Marufuji takes the mic and says that he will win the Global League as you'd expect. He's not going to say 'nah, I've done for this year, wait and see who the champ is, I might lie down seven times for all it matters.' Despite my grousing, a fun match that perhaps could have gone to other places. ***3/4

Marufuji d. Sekimoto

Global League is happening now, though in chronology let's say that it isn't: 16 men, two groups of eight, let's see if I can remember them inside 90 seconds. Marufuji, Yone, Sekimoto, Kojima, Nagata, Chris Hero, Colt Cabana, Quiet Storm, Tanaka, Sugiura, Morishima, Taniguchi, Nakajima, Nicholls, Haste, Saito. WHOO!