NJPW Strong Episode 24 1/22/2021

NJPW Strong Episode 24 1/22/2021

More pics and gifs to come in a little.

 Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/01/njpw-strong-episode-23-1152021.html

 Kevin Kelly and Alex Kozlov welcome us to the show.

 Kevin Knight & Jordan Clearwater vs The Riegel Twins (Logan & Sterling Riegel)

Knight flips out of a wristlock. JC comes in and the Twins hit a long move combo on him. The twins grab each of JC's arms, but he pulls them in together. Knight hits a big dropkick and ends up landing horribly. A twin takes a double shoulder from JC and Knight.

JC backdrops Logan for 2. Sterling clears house on his opponents with clotheslines. Sterling does an axe kick legdrop then slingblade's JC on the apron. Sterling dives on JC. Knight misses a dropkick and gets kicked in the face. The twins hit an assisted DDT for the win. This was only 6:12 but they kept it moving with a lot of action. There's just only so much you can do with 4 people in 6 minutes.

Brody King was interviewed. He said Kratos came here to pick a fight with the biggest guy. King said if Kratos thinks he is going to make a name for himself off of him, he picked the wrong guy.

JR Kratos vs Brody King

YESSSSS. Been hoping for this for a while and this should be a good one. Nothin' better than two hosses going at it.

Lots of forearms and chops to start this before King takes a stungun. King gets thrown into the buckles and falls. Kratos hits a flying leg lariat but the camera's miss most of it.

They each hit some corner lariats and Brody hits like a sidewalk slam at 5 minutes. They trade punches and Kratos clotheslines him. Kratos hits a slap and takes a double chop. Kratos fakes him out with a punch, then hits a punch and knees him. Kratos hit a big corner splash but King exploder suplexes him in the corner and cannonballs him in the corner.

Kratos catches King on a crossbody and then slams him, then suplexes him. King hits him with a german and a lariat. Kratos gets back up and King wins with some short lariats.

This would have been a lot better with a crowd. It wasn't that great. The selling just wasn't there and they just didn't do some of the forearm, shoulder or lariat battles I was hoping for.

Ren Narita vs Bateman

Bateman does a nice escape early. They go to the mat and Narita headstands out of a headscissors. Then he puts Bateman in his own headscissors. Bateman grabs him by the face and knees him in the back, then forearms him in the back of the head. They give each other some forearms and Bateman double thrusts him into the throat. Ren fires up with some forearms and gets his neck draped over the ropes.

Bateman hits some strikes and is overhead belly to belly suplexed. Ren butterfly suplexes him and floats over for the pin attempt. Ren hits a russian legsweep and a type of indian deathlock which Bateman ropebreaks for. Bateman hits a neat back elbow and a hard lariat.

Bateman hits like a northern lights bomb for 2. Ren evades a lariat into a cobra twist but Bateman hits the ropes. Ren then german suplexes him for 2.

Ren puts him in a texas cloverleaf and wins with the submission. This went 14:53 and was too long. Bateman doesn't really hit hard enough for the style he is trying to do and the lack of crowd really hurt this one. This is one of Ren's first big wins here and the announcer puts it over.

Ren did a promo after and said he wasn't satisfied yet.

Overall thoughts: This wasn't anything special or worth seeing. King/Kratos wasn't as good as expected and the main went too long.