Dragon Gate 1/12/2022 Open The New Year Gate 2022 Day 4

Dragon Gate 1/12/2022 Open The New Year Gate 2022 Day 4

I skipped two of the matches here.

HIGH-END (Ben-K, Dragon Kid, Kagetora & YAMATO) vs Natural Vibes (Genki Horiguchi, Jacky Funky Kamei, Kzy & U-T)

Jacky hit a nice dropkick early then got dropped on his neck with a shoulder block by Ben. Yamato took the double stretch band shots to the face then got whipped with it by Genki. Jacky and Yamato had a chop battle. Kid took a bunch of corner moves and Jacky was held up by his team so he could do a short flurry of boots ala Jackie Chan. Kid hit his inside to outside moonsault off the 2nd rope and Yamato picked up the win with a solaria/reverse ddt high-end drop.

The crowd isn't allowed to cheer for this and if they did it would have been better. It wasn't a real great match though and with so many people and so little time, there wasn't too much they could do. Jacky is a fun wrestler though.

BIG BOSS Shimizu vs Takumi Hayakawa

Shimizu is wearing a rikishi style mawashi with Jamaican colors. Takumi was quickly pop up samoan dropped then took a top rope splash for the quick loss in 41 seconds.

Keisuke Okuda vs Ryu Fuda

Ryu Fuda

Fuda slaps away Okuda early then dropkicks him in the back and pounds on him. Fuda kicked him the back then they both started doing it to each other. They traded running facekicks and Fuda took a hard corner dropkick. Fuda tried to fight back with forearms but was nailed down then Okuda was teeing off on him with short kicks and pushed him down.

While Fuda was down, Okuda then started punching him to the back with hard shots. Fuda tried to fight back with forearms but was hit with one strong one back and downed. Okuda then high kicked him hard and Okuda spun on his butt off a missile dropkick sell. Fuda took more hard forearms and a hard punch and Fuda downed him with a high kick after a kick trade. Okuda had him with a sleeper and let go then pinned him as the refs checked on him.

This was my kind of match here with hard shots and lots of fighting spirit from Fuda. It was basically like an old battlarts style match and I really enjoyed this one.

Don Fuji, Masaaki Mochizuki, Shuji Kondo and Yasushi Kanda vs Ishin Iihashi, Riki Iihashi, Shoya Sato and Takuma Fujiwara

Dragon Gate got a bunch of new rookies over the last year and I'm stoked. The fans tried to go along with Mocchy's theme but since they can't chant, they just had to do raised fists for the Mocchy parts. Mocchy and Fuji are both 51 and Mocchy looks great.

The vets did a group cheer and then rookies did it too to mock them. The Iihashi's are the sons of Utako Hozumi, one of my LLPW favs. The bros double shouldered Fuji and Mocchy then hit a sloppy double team. Fujiwara did a nice flip off of a shoulder tackle from Kondo and hit a nice dropkick. Sato and Fuji had a fun little section with Fuji chopping him hard in the ear then kicking him hard in the face.

Kondo did a hard double stomp on Riki then Fuji him Riki with some hard slaps. 3 of the rookies got octopus stretches on the vets but the 4th one failed and Fuji broke them all up. The rookies then group stomped Fuji. Riki tried to submit Fuji with a camel clutch variation but couldn't and Fujiawa did a cool outside to inside no-touch double stomp.

Kondo hit his lanzarse on Fujiawa and Kanda John Woo'd his partner. Sato took a chokeslam and was able to catch Fuji with an armbar on the way down, but Fuji got out and pinned him.

This was a really fun rookies vs vets match. They made it feel like the rookies actually had a chance here I thought for sure they would pull it off. The vets bullied around the rooks and the rookies did what they were supposed to and showed a lot of fight against the vets.

Open The Triangle Gate Titles - R.E.D. (Eita, H.Y.O & Kaito Ishida) vs MASQUERADE (Jason Lee, Kota Minoura & Shun Skywalker)

Shun is now wearing all of Masquerade's masks since his partners refuse to do so. Neither team wanted to line-up with their partners for the pose pre-match.

Shun's partners refused his tag early and he force tagged Lee in. Hyo's partners refused his tag. Hyo hit a nice flying headscissors but his tag was refused again. Lee and Kota did a double team on Hyo then Shun dove in quickly to try and steal the pin. Kota had Eita up on his shoulders and flipped him backwards on an opponent.

Hyo tried to help up Ishida then both got dropkicked by Shun. Lee hit a nice assisted tornado ddt then did a flip dive to the outside. Kento helped out Hyo with a box attack but Minoura got it and ended up nailing Shun with it on accident. Hyo then picked up the win.

The storytelling was good here with both teams hating each other, but it didn't lead to a super fun match. Hyo's partners refused the tag belts after they won.

After the match Shun and Hyo decided to join together. Eita and Ishida tried to kick out Hyo but then RED and Shun beat up on Eita and Ishida.

Open The Brave Gate Title - SB KENTo vs Dragon Dia

Dia just got unmasked recently and came out riding a skateboard. Dia immediately did a springboard in and dropkicked SB. He then flip dived on him and RED. Dia came off th esecond rope and caught SB with a DDT. Hyo tripped Dia but Dia Inferno came out and wanted to hit Dia with salt instead of Hyo. Inferno then hit Hyo with the salt and unmasked as Yuki Yoshioka. Dia then did the Manami Toyota roll and won the match in 90 seconds.

Dia and Yuki said they would challenge for the tag titles after. RED refused but GM Ryo Saito went with it anyway.

Overall thoughts: I liked 2 of the matches I saw here, though I did skip two. A lot of stuff happened on this show and it would definitely be one to watch if you plan to follow DG. It's not that the show was bad, but some of the stories they were telling meant lesser matches.