2022's Best and Worst Pro-Wrestling Matches of the Year (plus Recommended)

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Sports Argument Stadium > The Hammer House: Stinger Splash Zone > 2022's Best and Worst Pro-Wrestling Matches of the Year (plus Recommended)

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 16 Night 1 January 4th
MOTYC
Katsuyori Shibata vs X
Shingo Takagi (c) vs Kazuchika Okada - IWGP World Heavyweight Championship

HM
Dangerous Tekkers (Taichi and Zach Sabre Jr) (c) vs CHAOS (Yoshi-Hashi and Hirooki Goto) - IWGP Tag Team Championships
El Desperado (c) vs Hiromu Takahashi - IWGP Jr Heavyweight Championship

Nth

# ¿ Jan 4, 2022 17:03

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ May 21, 2024 21:41

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

Wrestle Kingdom 16 Night 2 January 5th
MOTYC
Kenta (c) vs Hiroshi Tanahashi - IWGP US Heavyweight Championship
Kazuchika Okada (c) vs Will Ospreay - IWGP World Heavyweight Championship

HM
Flying Tigers (Robbie Eagles and Tiger Mask) (c) vs Mega Coaches (Ryusuke Taguchi and Rocky Romero) vs Bullet Club's Cutest Tag Team (Taiji Ishimori and El Phantasmo) - IWGP Jr Tag Team Championships
Tam Nakano and Saya Kamitani vs Mayu Iwatani and Starlight Kid
Toru Yano vs CIMA vs Minoru Suzuki vs Chase Owens
Tetsuya Naito vs Jeff Cobb

Great show

Nth. Main event is must must must see.

# ¿ Jan 5, 2022 16:08

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Lamuella posted:

HM: Eddie Kingston vs Gabriel Kidd, New Japan Strong, January 8. A King's Road vs Strong Style epic, as performed by an angry kid from Nottingham and a dirtbag from Yonkers. Eddie has the emotion of the wild veteran, Kidd has the fire of a young Shibata protégé. The strikes and throws here are great, and a version of this match that had a story going into it would be in MOTYC territory.

Nth

# ¿ Jan 9, 2022 14:00

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

AEW Rampage 2/18
MOTYC - Trent Beretta vs Jay White

NJPW 2/19
HM - Great O'Khan vs Honma
HM - Jr Tag 4-way
MOTYC - Tanahashi vs SANADA

# ¿ Feb 19, 2022 19:15

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Jerusalem posted:

MOTYC: Kazuchika Okada (C) vs. Tetsuya Naito for the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship - NJPW Golden Series 2/20

The ONLY thing this was missing was the crowd being able to lose their poo poo, and they still lost their poo poo at points anyway because HOLY gently caress WHAT A MATCH!

Nth. Amazing that these two still have new places they can go.

# ¿ Feb 20, 2022 22:44

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

New Japan Cup 3/2
HM - CIMA vs Taka
HM - Yoshi-Hashi vs Honma
HM - Goto vs Nagata
HM - Tanahashi vs YOH
HM - Naito vs Yujiro
MOTYC - Okada vs Desperado

Great show, insanely great main event.

# ¿ Mar 2, 2022 17:19

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW New Japan Cup Night 7 March 13th
MOTYC
Hiromu Takahashi vs Minoru Suzuki
- MiSu is the King, that's never gonna change. Even when some young poo poo is slapping his chest raw

HM
EVIL vs Tama Tonga
- This was way more enjoyable than I thought it'd be. Bullet Club are fine

I'll Nth these, as well as the Jay White match from Strong last night.

Shingo/Loa was borderline HM as well.

# ¿ Mar 13, 2022 22:49

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

GEORGE W BUSHI posted:

MOTYC: Taichi vs Kazuchika Okada - NJPW New Japan Cup (3/14)

Okada is the runaway wrestler of the year right now. Incredible match.

HM: CIMA vs Hirooki Goto

Really great work with a super sick finishing sequence.

Nth

# ¿ Mar 15, 2022 09:47

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Jerusalem posted:

HM: Hiromu Takahashi vs. EVIL - NJPW New Japan Cup 3/18

Too much of the normal House of Torture nonsense to put it over the top, but the hot crowd and the finish of this match and Hiromu's post-match promo made this one to watch.

Nth. I'll HM Shingo/Chase too.

# ¿ Mar 18, 2022 12:58

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Jerusalem posted:

HM: Tetsuya Naito vs. Jeff Cobb - NJPW New Japan Cup 3/20

Man this was good, and it is great seeing Naito getting more in the dickbag LIJ persona again. Plus, you know, Cobb STRONK! etc!

Lamuella posted:

MOTYC: Buddy Matthews vs Ren Narita. New Japan Strong: Rivals, March 19

I know, I know, it's a MOTYC nomination for a match on Strong. how good could it actually be? Really loving good. Up there with the main events on today's DDT show for me. Matthews has strength, conditioning, and skill. Narita is Shibata 2.0, with the best training in the world behind him. This starts off with Matthews condescending to Narita, and then at about the five minute mark, Narita just starts loving with his head, forcing Matthews to actually take him seriously. Excellent, skillful duel between someone entering his absolute prime and the future of New Japan.

Jerusalem posted:

HM: Hiromu Takahashi vs. Shingo Takagi - NJPW New Japan Cup 3/21
Great match but not the result I ultimately wanted (even though I predicted it!)

MOTYC: Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Will Ospreay - NJPW New Japan Cup 3/21
Great match and not the result I expected but YESSSSS!!!!

Nth

# ¿ Mar 22, 2022 21:18

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW Wrestling Dontaku May 1st
MOTYC
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs Tomohiro Ishii - IWGP US Heavyweight Championship
- Watch the match, it was incredible

Kazuchika Okada (c) vs Tetsuya Naito - IWGP World Heavyweight Championship
- You know when you watch a match and it's incredible and you think it won't be topped. Then a match like this comes along and just shits all over it. Yeah it's their third match this year, but gently caress me this was amazing

HM
EVIL (c) vs Tama Tonga - NEVER Openweight Championship
- Jado the Hero got the crowd popping huge for this match, it certainly helps that Tama and Evil work really well together

El Desperado (c) vs Taiji Ishimori - IWGP Jr Heavyweight Championship
- Great action, hot crowd, interesting lead in to Best of Super Juniors next week

Nth all these as well as Lethal/Narita from Strong. King of Sports.

# ¿ May 2, 2022 02:41

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

HM - Jay White vs Hikuleo - NJPW Strong May 13

# ¿ May 14, 2022 12:38

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW Best of the Super Jr Night 2 May 17th
HM
DOUKI vs El Lindaman
- These two work really well together, great way to kick off the block

Wheeler Yuta vs Robbie Eagles
- Very well worked match, Eagles was the more impressive for me but Yuta got to show off some cool stuff including some sort of...standing heel hook from tombstone position?

Master Wato vs TJP
- This was good, Wato was a great foil to history's greatest monster TJP

El Desperado vs Tit�n
- Blew the main event of night 1 out of the water, very hard fought

Great show, B Block is full of killers after A Block stumbled out of the blocks on Sunday

Nth

# ¿ May 17, 2022 13:41

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

NJPW 6/20
HM - Honma vs Connors
HM - Ishii vs Kanemaru
HM - TJP/Akira vs Wato/Taguchi

# ¿ Jun 20, 2022 14:19

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Jerusalem posted:

MOTYC: Taiji Ishimori (C) vs. Hiromu Takahashi for the IWGP Jr Heavyweight Championship - New Japan Road 6/21

Ishimori REALLY brought his A game and Hiromu did too, and the only thing holding this down is that the crowd still aren't allowed to cheer and you could tell they REALLY wanted to.

Seams posted:

HM: Ishii vs Clark Connors. NJPW Road, 21/6

Nth

# ¿ Jun 21, 2022 15:17

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW G1 Climax Night 4 July 23rd
MOTYC
Shingo Takagi vs YOSHI-HASHI
- Yeah, it's Shingo. But Yoshi-Hashi showed off that he can be real loving good as well

Tomohiro Ishii vs Jay White
- Big Tom very rarely has an off night, and Jay White may be the closest thing we have to a perfect wrestler

HM
Zack Sabre Jr vs Aaron Henare
- Henare showed up here, it was great to watch

Nth

# ¿ Jul 23, 2022 17:34

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Burn Down Canberra posted:

G1 Climax 24/7

Motyc : taichi v sanada
Motyc : tana v naito

Nth

# ¿ Jul 24, 2022 17:43

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

MOTYC - Finlay vs Juice (7/26)
HM - Goto vs Henare (7/27)
HM - Ishii vs Tama Tonga (7/27)

# ¿ Jul 27, 2022 17:30

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

MOTYC - Alex Shelley vs. Kushida - NJPW Music City Mayhem 7/30
Shocked that this didn't even get HMs by the other people who have nominated stuff from this show. Maybe I'm crazy, but this was my favorite 2005 ROH-style match that I've seen in a while.

# ¿ Jul 31, 2022 03:48

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW G1 Climax Night 10 August 2nd
MOTYC
David Finlay vs Will Ospreay

This match was awesome. Nth.

# ¿ Aug 3, 2022 00:31

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW G1 Climax Night 12 August 6th
MOTYC
Zack Sabre Jr vs Hirooki Goto
- ZSJ is a master of the craft, he can even get a great match out of notorious choke artist Goto

Jay White vs Great O-Khan
- Switchblade you absolute piece of poo poo, how are you this goddamn good

Will Ospreay vs Shingo Takagi
- These two have always had such amazing chemistry no matter what weight class they're in

HM
YOSHI-HASHI vs El Phantasmo
- World class talent with another banger

Lance Archer vs Toru Yano
- Very funny stuff

Fantastic night of matches with a red hot clap crowd, if we had full cheering back this could have been an alltimer block night

Nth - best show of the tournament.

Also, I'll give a MOTYC nom to Jonah vs Jeff Cobb from 8/5

# ¿ Aug 6, 2022 15:53

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW G1 Climax Night 13 August 7th
MOTYC
JONAH vs Kazuchika Okada
- Might be Jonah's best match at the G1, between this and the Cobb match. Awesome stuff from the Top Dog

HM
El Phantasmo vs Juice Robinson
- This started off very silly between two ridiculous men then devolved into an absolute war between Bullet Club brethren, was going to give this a MOTYC nod before the ending hosed it

Tomohiro Ishii vs Chase Owens
- Ishii played to Chase's strength, looking like a monster for Chase to do some cool looking offense on, would not be opposed to these guys running it back

Not at the level of last night's, but few things would be. Still a very entertaining card for the most part

Nth - end of the main event was unreal.

# ¿ Aug 7, 2022 15:26

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

I'll go MOTYC on ZSJ/Evil, Lawlor/Okada, and Tanahashi/Goto - all from the 8/10 G1 show.

# ¿ Aug 10, 2022 20:32

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

HM for Jay/Taichi and Ospreay/Yoshi-Hashi

# ¿ Aug 13, 2022 15:35

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

NJPW G1 Semifinals - 8/17

MOTYC
Okada vs Tama Tonga
Naito vs Ospreay

HM
Dangerous Tekkers vs Lawlor & Isaacs

# ¿ Aug 17, 2022 12:59

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

NJPW G1 Climax Night 20 August 18th
MOTYC
Kazuchika Okada vs Will Ospreay
- loving nothing touches main event New Japan, the last 10 minutes were absolutely insane

Nth for the same reason.

# ¿ Aug 18, 2022 20:17

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Lamuella posted:

HM Blake Christian vs Hiromu Takahashi vs El Desperado, New Japan Strong High Alert, broadcast August 21st

Hot crowd, playful spots, and a hell of a last minute performance from Blake Christian. Hiromu and Despy can have a great match in their sleep, but Christian really stepped up here.

Nth - Really fun from start to finish.

# ¿ Aug 21, 2022 17:02

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

SG Bamboo posted:

GLEAT G-Pro Wrestling Ver.31 August 24th
MOTYC
El Lindaman (c) vs DOUKI - G-REX Title

Great show, watch it if you haven't yet. The DOUKI/Lindaman and Kento/Izuchi matches only need one more nth to make the list. Even if it's not for his beloved All Japan Kento should get the recognition, this is the 12th match i've nominated for him this year and is the closest he's come

I'll Nth Lindaman/DOUKI

# ¿ Aug 30, 2022 21:31

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Rarity posted:

HM: TJP/Francesco Akira vs. 6 or 9, NJPW Burning Spirit, 25/09

A great sprint with some really neat spots sprinkled in

Rarity posted:

MOTYC: Will Ospreay vs. David Finlay, NJPW Burning Spirit, 25/09

One day this year David woke up and realised what family he's from

Nth these

# ¿ Sep 27, 2022 16:14

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Jerusalem posted:

MOTYC: Ren Narita vs. Tomohiro Ishii - NJPW Battle Autumn 10/26

Holy poo poo, Ishii rules of course but Narita has absolutely loving NAILED his Son of Strong Style character. Insane match, perfect examples of when and when not to sell, and this time not just from the master Ishii! And that ending!

Nth

# ¿ Oct 26, 2022 14:28

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

HM - Minoru Suzuki vs Fred Yehi - NJPW Strong 11/12
The best match I've seen of Suzuki's recent American tour.

# ¿ Nov 15, 2022 18:25

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

I'll Nth these:
WMOTYC - Hikuleo vs Anderson
HM - LiYOH vs Ace/Bey
MOTYC - Bishimon vs Aussie Open

Weird show. Feels like more should have been set up for the Dome. But at least the last two matches were good.

# ¿ Dec 14, 2022 15:50

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ May 21, 2024 21:41

Price Check: Oct 9, 2012

Edward Mass posted:

HM: "Speedball" Mike Bailey vs. Yuya Uemura, Impact on AXS 12/22

Nth - Yuya's excursion is going really well.

# ¿ Dec 24, 2022 02:30

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Sports Argument Stadium > The Hammer House: Stinger Splash Zone > 2022's Best and Worst Pro-Wrestling Matches of the Year (plus Recommended)