New Japan Pro Wrestling Road to Tokyo Dome 12/23/2020

 New Japan Pro Wrestling Road to Tokyo Dome 12/23/2020

 3rd NJPW house show in 3 days...it's wearing on me. Thankfully this is it until the Tokyo Dome.

Tiger Mask, Ryusuke Taguchi and Master Wato vs Yota Tsuji, Yuya Uemura and Gabriel Kidd

Kidd nails Wato with a shoulder early and Wato returns fire with a kick. Yota gets some good forearms in on Tiger. Yota and Tiger trade some good shots and Tiger hits the Tiger Driver on Yota. Kidd suplxes Taguchi for a near fall but Taguchi recovers and butt bumps him. Kidd tries a dropkick on Wato but is too close and it doesn't hit right. Yuya comes in with some fire and crabs Wato. Wato hits a nice kick combo on Yuya and really knocks him loopy on the high kick. Wato boots him in the face then kicks him hard in the gut before a nearfall. Wato then hits a corkscrew from the top for the win. This was quick with no time wasted and Yuya really got the crap kicked out of him by Wato.

Hiromu Takahashi, Shingo Takagi and SANADA vs Taiji Ishimori, Dick Togo and EVIL

They all start brawling before the bell rings. Hiromu goes for a headscissors but Taiji catches him. He then hits it on a second try. Togo removes the turnbuckle pad and Hiromu goes into the exposed steel. Togo grabs Hiromu by the hair and swings him around. Evil tries to lowblow Hiromu after whipping his leg into the ref, but Hiromu turns it into a dragon screw instead. Sanada makes Evil bounce off the railings then pounds on him, then Evil gives it back to him by sending him into the rails.

Togo crossfaces Shingo. Shingo tries to turn it into a tombstone, but Togo gets out and Evil trips Shingo. Togo tries to choke Shingo but Shingo just drops him backwards sand sliding lariat's him. Evil hits a big low blow on Sanada and Shingo drills evil with a lariat. Shingo then runs over Togo with a lariat and wins it in a fun sprint.

Evil chairs people after the match and him and Sanada duel chairs after. Then they brawl out into the crowd.

KOPW 2020 Title - Bodyslam or Last Cornerpad Match - Toru Yano vs Bad Luck Fale

The way I understand this is that if either hits a bodyslam or removes the last of the four turnbuckles, they win.

Yano tries to shill his stuff, then Fale breaks his trophy. Yano has some kind of backpack on. Fale opens the backpack and there is something heavy inside. Fale tries to drop it on Yano, but Yano moves. Yano sprays Fale with something and removes a turnbuckle pad.

Fale hits Yano with a pad and when the ref stops him, Yano removes another and hits him with it. We go down to the last pad and Yano blocks a slam. Yano goes down and Fale works on the last one but can't get it. Yano gets a free shot at the last one and Chase Owens hits him, stopping it. Chase then ties it down.

Yano grabs the heavy bag in the backpack and throws it at the ref who falls, and Yano gets slammed. But, because the ref is down, he doesn't see it. Yano low blows Fale and Chase jumps in, then he throws the heavy bag at Cahse and hits the slam for the win! Silly but not too business exposing and a little funny. 

Toa Henare and Satoshi Kojima vs Jay White and KENTA

I almost wrote Toga Henare. That would be something.

Kenta tries to kick Toa but can't get anywhere, so Toa combos him and drops down a big chop. White beats up on Toa on the outside. Kenta makes the mistake of trying to hit Toa's head off the buckles and Toa fires up.

Kojima gets in and does his machine gun chops to Kenta. Kenta kicks Kojima but gets caught and dragonscrewed. Kenta blocks Kojima's forearm and hits come spinning chops. Toa gets in and Jay runs for it. Toa does a running samoan drop. White tries to knee Toa out of a suplex but he hits it and it is a little bit ugly. Jay gets some offense in but Toa fires up again and hits some strikes for 2.

Kojima gets in and during the confusion, Jay hits a twisting brainbuster to Toa. Toa powers out of Jay's chops and hits an ugly elbow and an ugly spin kick. Toa then nails him with a spear. Toa goes for something and Jay turns it into a dragon suplex and a blade runner for the win.

If Toa can clean up his strikes, he's someone worth pushing. He looks legit and has a lot of fire. This was a good showcase for Toa who stole the show.

Great-O-Khan, Will Osperay and Jeff Cobb vs Hiroshi Tanahashi, Kazuchika Okada and Tomoaki Honma

We saw this same match two days ago and I reviewed it here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2020/12/new-japan-pro-wrestling-road-to-tokyo.html

 

The heels jump the faces after intro's. Osperay really goes after Okada. Okada fires back and Will does a neat sell off of a boot. Khan and Tana have a long forearm exchange and the faces do a 3v1 combo on Khan. Khan tries mongolian chops but Tana stops them, and he just has enough and grounds and pounds him. Tana returns the favor in a fun little segment.

Tana gets his leg worked on and gets beat down for a bit. Tana makes the hot tag to Okada who gets the edge over Will. They trade forearms and Okada gets a big one from Will. Okada totally misses on a euro uppercut but Will sells it anyway and they do an akward kick to the back of the head.

Honma comes in and he has the flexibility of a refridgerator these days. He and Cobb don't have a very good segment. Tana slingblades Khan and Honma/Cobb clothesline battle each other. Honma tries a headbutt from the top and misses and Honma gets a tour of the islands. Honma then gets pinned with a swinging slam. It started out well but Honma and Cobb wrestled most of the match and Honma is just limited nowadays. 

The fight continues after the match with Okada taking a rolling elbow. The heels pose over Okads and Tana comes in with a chair and clear them out and nails Khan a bunch of times.

SHO and Kota Ibushi vs BUSHI and Tetsuya Naito

Naito and Ibushi go on the mat for a bit to start. Bushi does a nice spinning hurricanrana on Kota. Naito does some foot thrusts on Kota's head and dares Kota to get up. When he does, he eyerakes him.

Ibushi gets picked on and gets blocked on tag attempt to SHO. Ibushi reverses an irish whip into a double pele kick. Sho gets in and starts working over Bushi. Naito does a nice little flurry on Sho. Kota then combo's Naito and does a sliding kick and a moonsault.  Naito and Kota trade forearms. Bushi comes in to get Naito the edge and he hurricanrana's Ibushi off the top. He hits some offense and Ibushi hits a big lariat.

Ibushi hits a big last ride sitout powerbomb on Naito, but Naito comes back with a gloria. Sho and Bushi go at it. Bushi hits something like an apron ddt over the middle rope and then a swinging neckbreaker that Ibushi breaks the pin on. Naito destino's Ibushi and Bushi codebreaker's Sho. Bushi and Sho traded forearms and Sho took him down with a clothesline. Sho then hit a powerbomb onto the knees for 2 and double wrist clutch package powerbomb for the win.

I didn't love this one. It wasn't so much of a tag match as half of two different singles matches. The Ibushi/Naito sections were fine, but then Sho and Bushi would come and then the whole match would change.

Overall thoughts:  Nothing was bad here, just some of it wasn't anything memorable. Possibly the best house show of this three house show run.