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| I bet Funaki is awesome to hang out with |
- The full roster of participants in the Mae Young Classic has been revealed, and if all goes to plan, I will have another one of my guides up on here to help fill everyone in on what to expect from each of the 32 women. I better act quick.
- Apparently Talking Smack is ceasing to air on a weekly basis and is now going to solely be for after SmackDown!'s Pay-Per-Views a la RAW Talk. What a load of shite.
- Fire Pro Wrestling World is out on Steam Early Access, and from everything I've seen/heard, it sounds like a blast. That PS4 release cannot come soon enough.
- Gail Kim has announced that 2017 will be her last year of in-ring competition. It's a shame we (probably) won't see her be able to compete in the reinvigorated WWE Women's division, but hey, that won't stop me wishing her all the success in her post-wrestling life.
- Former ROH Tag Team and Television Champion, Bobby Fish debuted on NXT this week! At the minute, I'm hoping a certain someone arrives to help him out in the Dusty Classic...
WWE Great Balls of Fire
Best Match on GBOF: Sheamus & Cesaro vs The Hardy Boyz (Matt & Jeff Hardy) - 30 Minute Iron Man Match for the RAW Tag Team Championships
Honourable Mention(s): Brock Lesnar vs Samoa Joe - WWE Universal Championship Match
We had another WWE PPV this week, coming in the form of Great Balls of Fire. Christ. Anyway, the best match, I feel, we had on the show was the bout for the RAW Tag Team Championships; the blowoff to the feud between The Hardy Boyz and the champions, Sheamus and Cesaro.
Personally, I love Iron Man matches. When you've got two guys (or more in this case) who can go and have had awesome matches with each other already, then setting up a dedicated 30 minutes to them goes down a treat. Typically, from the first bell to the first fall is the longest time to get a point, and is something I was expecting, but this opening was genius I thought;
I recall Sheamus and Cesaro doing that fake out before, and I loved it then, but it didn't result in a pinfall like this. So, this addition made it infinitely cooler.
Sheamus and Cesaro built a considerable lead from there, eventually finding themselves 2-0 and later 3-1 up, the whole while being bold, brash and dominating. The Hardys were on the back foot and got worked over hard for a large portion of it, but the last 10ish minutes saw the brothers kick it up a notch and even things up to 3-3.
Round of applause has to go to Cesaro for his continued efforts in breaking up pins and coming out of thin air to do so. There were a handful of times where the three count was about to fall, and that beautiful Swiss bastard would dive in from off screen and save the point for his team. Perfect timing every time.
Cesaro stealing that last pin off of Jeff's Swanton was another stroke of genius, taking that last point to secure the victory in the dying minutes. Then, Matt and Jeff's strive to get one more fall, coming down to missing the pin by a matter of seconds. Great drama worked in there, and I was happy to see my boys Sheamus and Cesaro leave with those belts. Really good match here, I feel I may not have done a great job of summarising this bout, but I hope you trust my judgement.
I do want to quickly talk about Joe/Lesnar as well. I was going back and forth on whether to list that as better, but I thought that it was maybe a smidge too short, and I wasn't a huge fan of how little offence it took Lesnar to defeat Joe (what, like 4 Germans, a couple knee strikes and an F5?). I will say that I was super hyped watching Joe fucking wreck Brock, and I hope to God he gets another shot at the title soon.
Monday Night RAW
Best Match on RAW (10/7/17): Seth Rollins vs Bray Wyatt
We're on RAW now and here we have a Great Balls of Fire rematch that I felt was stronger than their match at the Pay-Per-View; its Bray Wyatt versus Seth Rollins.
A big part of this match was Bray working on the eye of Rollins that was damaged on the Sunday show. This was super interesting and engaging to me. The eye is a body part that I have I have only seen targeted on a very rare occasion. Of course, the Neville/Aries feud featured this fairly recently, but other than that, I really can't think of any other instances of it used. This incorporated Bray throwing some straight shots to Seth's face, headbutts and again using the ropes to inflict damage, all of it looking pretty damn cool.
In response, Rollins did come to target Wyatt's hand, another lesser worked on body part. However, though we've seen the likes of Marty Scurll and Pete Dunne, it was less manipulation and stretching, and more just brute force, namely stomping on Wyatt's poor little digits.
The end say Wyatt pick up a second victory over Rollins in the span of two days, and Seth sold that Sister Abigail like a motherfucker. Ragdolled and died;
Another strong match here from RAW, good stuff indeed.
SmackDown! LIVE
Best Match on SD (11/7/17): Rusev & Kevin Owens vs AJ Styles & John Cena
It's a SmackDown! Special, get two sets of rivals and make a tag match (playa). With that in mind, what we had here was the sort of thing you'd expect from this set up. Luckily, we've got some class wrestlers in the mix here; AJ, Cena, Ru-Ru and Kevvy Ow-Ow. I was fucking amped at the prospect of AJ/Cena IV at the top of the show, but I guess that will have to wait. Anyway, decent match here, but definitely some better matches this week.
205 Live
Best Match on 205 (11/7/17): Cedric Alexander vs Noam Dar - I Quit Match
This week on 205 Live we got another top dollar match. Although the continuation of this Cedric/Dar feud may not have been the most appealing, this I Quit stipulation made this an awesome match.
There was some goddamn brutal stuff in this match. Noam worked the leg of Cedric for a bit, wrenching it real bad and kicking the bejeezus out of it, and that was enough to make me wince. There was a bunch of horrific looking submissions throughout, but topping it for me was when Cedric got Dar's fingers in the turnbuckle and bent them around the steel - Fucking Ow.
The finish of the match would be surprising brutal, especially coming from Cedric, with this being possibly the nastiest finish to an I Quit match I've seen in quite some time;
Christ above Cedric.
I thought this was an awesome match, continuing 205 Live's trend to have baller matches that have the potential to fly right under the radar. Not on my watch, not on Noah's Best Wrestling of the Week! Check this one out, guys!
NXT
Best Match on NXT (12/7/17): Aleister Black vs Bobby Fish
Holy shit we had a cool ass match here on NXT this week. We had the debut of Bobby Fish! Here, taking on the undefeated Aleister Black, he had a fair challenge in his first match with the company, and what a awesome one it was.
With both men being experienced in all that dope MMA style stuff, they had a match that focused on it. The opening minutes saw the feeling out process in effect, both men teasing kicks and strikes as they look to find an opportunity to take advantage of. Black would find early momentum against the debutant, however soon Fish would find himself on top of things.
These guys were stiff as all hell, proper leathering each other with these kicks. I get that kickpads must play a part in the sound generated, but good lord there was some loud claps of thunder coming from those chest kicks.
This match did see possibly the best Black Mass roundhouse kick yet, with Fish taking it on the chin and falling like a tree that had just been kicked in the fucking face. So Black's streak continues, but it was a strong showing for Fish in his first appearance on NXT.
I really enjoyed this match and definitely recommend you seek it out. It got a good 15 minutes of air time given to it and made for a nice start to the episode. Plus, the Authors of Pain faced Heavy Machinery too this week and that was pretty cool too.
Ring of Honour
Best Match on ROH TV (Episode 303): Coast 2 Coast (Shaheem Ali & LSG) & Flip Gordon vs Dalton Castle & The Boys
Coast 2 Coast are popping up again here on ROH TV, teaming with a growing favourite of mine, Flip Gordon to take on the new ROH Six-Man Tag Champions, Dalton Castle and The Boys.
First off, holy hell we had some sick flips in this match. LSG's springboard tornado to the outside is ever exciting, and I think this match marks the first time I've seen a 450 off the top to a group on the outside, coming to you from the one and only Flip Gordon. Awesome stuff there.
I felt like Dalton and The Boys had a few heelish moves mixed into their work in this match, with Dalton popping off a couple cheap shots and The Boys working twin magic. However, it is gonna take more than that to get Castle booed by the ROH faithful, plus, I'm not sure you'd want to anyway. Castle is arguably the most cheered member on the ROH roster aside from The Young Bucks.
Lots of great action here in this match, really enjoying Coast 2 Coast lately and hope they get more opportunities on TV, because lord knows The Young Bucks need some more challengers for their belts. As always, you can catch ROH TV for FREE on either www.rohwrestling.com/tv/current, on the Fite TV app, or at www.fite.tv
Lucha Underground
Best Match on LU (S3E26): Jeremiah Crane vs Taya
Coming at us from the underground now and we have the next round of the Cuerto Cup getting under way, with this episode opening with Jeremiah Crane taking on Taya from the Worldwide Underground.
Crane battered the fuck out of Taya; equal right, equal fights. After slapping him across the face, the Lucha Death Machine went to work and brutalised the luchadora, diving on her, dragging her over the arena, using his awesome pump kicks and not holding back at all. Taya did come round to get her licks in off the back-foot, with the fans eventually becoming split on the two competitors.
Sexy Star ended up popping and ultimately cost Taya the match. Apart from that, a real fun match here to open the show, here's hoping Crane goes all the way!
The Verdict
Best Match of the Week: Aleister Black vs Bobby Fish - NXT
This was a real tough pick this week. I went back and forth between the Great Balls of Fire tag match and this here winner, deleting and retyping the line above a good few times. Ultimately, I feel that this match has stuck with me more as being more entertaining. The Iron Man match did have some moments of it feeling to drag, but that was masked quite well by Sheamus and Cesaro's taunting and commentary's hyping of the time. Black/Fish felt like a raw wrestling match, two dudes going at it and making it come off like a real fight. Also, I would like to say that Cedric/Dar was a very close and admirable third place, don't sleep on that one either.
And with that week done, dusted and polished, here's how the leaderboard looks now, with the gap between Omega and Style slowly closing, but with the upcoming G1 Climax, I feel like there's gonna be some stiff competition.
Now, there's just time to award 'The Best Promo of the Week' and this time around it comes in the form of (mainly) Samoa Joe on Monday Night RAW as he looks for another chance at the Universal Championship, and also throws some words Reigns' way as well.
That's gonna do me for this edition of Noah's Best Wrestling of the Week, I hope you enjoyed, and if you do have any feedback, please do let me know. I strive to make this weekly blog the best it can be, and you can help with that! Other than that, I wish you all the best in the upcoming days and hope you find fortune in your exploits. Seeya!
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