Dragon Gate USA: Open the Untouchable Gate

I believe this is their 2nd big show, seeing as I reviewed the first, I'll weigh in on this one.

1) Dragon Kid v. Masato Yoshino - 5
I thought watching the beginning Yoshino was still improving his selling, which was really cool that he figured out after 6-7 years in the business when you sell like certain moves hurt it makes the match more realistic. But he isn't able to interact with the fans at all. DK was great though, all his acrobatic stuff looked as good as anything the WCW Cruiserweight division was excelling at in the late 90's. Too bad 10's of millions of people aren't watching this shit, or is it? Was perfect for an opener, it didn't drag on and the finish was clean and they played off the last match.

2) Mike Quackenbush/ Jigsaw v. YAMATO/ Gran Akuma - 3
Wasn't feeling this at all. Quack and Yamato I was looking forward to, and they pulled some good stuff off. But Akuma was his usual wax dummyof himself, not doing much to exude any kind of emotional response to what he was doing. I've not seen Jigsaw blow so many spots before but he did, watching he and Akuma trade strikes was like seeing two penguins fight each other with their flippers, pathetic. A lot of this match felt like filler, like they weren't really working towards anything, just filling in the allotted time they got that night to wrestle.

3) Bryan Danielson v. Naruki Doi - 7
Some things I liked here, Danielson always pushing against someone when they have him locked up or backed into the ropes, of course you would do that. His devious limb manipulation during the whole middle, some really evil torture to Doi's arm. It got way too spotty near the end, some of Doi's big moves look more suited to be used on a Twister mat than in a wrestling match, so the end was a joke to me, but all the physicality leading up to it, esp. from Danielson's behalf was a jolly good time.

4) CIMA v. Brian Kendrick - 4
At one point CIMA is about to butt hump Kendrick; what that has to with anything I have no idea. They were going at break neck speed, sometimes crashing into the stone medians in the road but no coherent story or pace kind of hurt what I was expecting to be a thrill a minute.

5) Davey Richards v. Shingo - 4
I know this match got tons of pub in 09, but I just don't see it. Late in the match, Shingo puts Davey on the top buckle after he's absorbed mounds and mounds of punishment, Davey is just looking down as if trying to remember the next spot, couldn't really tell if anything had happened to him or not. Things like that completely take you out of it. This is not strong style, if that's what they were trying to emulate, it's the opposite, those guys tack the beatings onto their punishment and show it as they go on. This match just felt like two guys beating each other up for no reason whatsoever, this match was working towards nothing. I didn't buy the end either, Shingo taps just because that's Davey's finish, with no build. Not into this.

6) Ryo Saito/ Genki Horiguchi v. Young Bucks- 5
I could go on and on about how much I loathe the Young Bucks style (or for that matter, that comment could also be applied to waking up before my alarm goes off, but ill save that for a different blog) but here they spent the first 10 minutes learning how to work an arm, then Matt tried his damndest to sell like any great tag wrestler he probably grew up watching every Sat evening. He fell far from the tree but the effort was there. Genki at best is the 10th best worker in Dragon Gate so seeing him turn up here was puzzling; He did a lot of perfunctory work and hammed itup but nothing really stood out. Saito was sort of like a honorary member of the Bucks as he took a slew of their offense without registering much of a reaction. Shocking the Bucks were the leaders here.