amy ✨

MAD COP PPV MAIN EVENTER

I've had my highs & lows with the Gaja/Psypatra stuff, but I like the setup for the cage because if they do it right, it follows the highly successful 2023 setup. Mante was the clear loser, but they teased a LOT otherwise.

Cielo is the obvious choice, but they've got great teases to play with here.

He's not only improved and become really consistent in-ring, but he's really embraced his heel character and become a great promo. He's held up the bulk of this really good midcard feud with Cielo (on account of the latter's identity being kept secret) and got himself over in AJPW. I'm happy for him

I like the cage match lineup a lot on paper and it's a really well-earned main event for Yoshiki Kato, imo the most improved wrestler in the promotion in the past year. His rivalry with Cielo has been great and this should be a great test to see what he can do in a bigger spot.

The Dragongate booking team making Shun Skywalker put his mask on the line in cage matches

Why am I so up for this LMFAOOOOOOO

King of Chop isn't gonna know what hit it this year

ISHIN please 😭😭🤼

WE'RE TAKING OVER

I think the three way trio Edion 2 main is the best match in Dragongate's otherwise painfully average start to the year. The heels kept the interferences down (and their wrestling in the match was very good), the build around Dragon Kid was great and Love & Peace can do no wrong. Highly recommend.

I'm just saying if we can't land Inoue for tag league, this surprise Mochizuki Jr/Kazuma Kimura tag team from today moves the fuck out of me

Yeah honestly I’m kind of stunned we’re at V9, he’s punching distance of the record, and like half the big guys in the division haven’t even touched him yet.

I’m not the keenest on the 2000X element, it just feels like a means to an end to get Shun vs Ozawa and not much else. The Gaja vs Psypatra stuff away from those guys (even though I love Masa and Sugiura) just feels more focused.

Yeah icl I know it’s been a topic about Shun as a babyface vs a tweener, but I don’t think this feud with Shimizu works nearly as well if he isn’t a tweener. I thought the Cielo finish was clever

Yeah I mean if there was any 1% doubts before that Cielo is TN and they’re deffo unmasking him it’s all done now lmao

MARIAAAAAAAAAA

I genuinely for the life of me can’t remember when it was announced last year but I remember going like oh SHIT it’s starting like now lmdaooo

I’m guessing either they announce it and start it straight away (iirc they did that last year?) or it’s moving to the May-June season, which actually could work quite nicely

Strong Machine J is the new GM? BRING BACK THE PRIME ZONE DANCE OFF

DG must really hate Fukuoka, the big stuff on these Edion 2 cards washes the big show lmfao

Shimizu vs Homare would be awesome. Homare I think is probably my joint pick to take the belt off Ryoya with Mochizuki Jr, but he's probably holding that thing til World so losing here wouldn't hurt and he's awesome as a ragdoll. Skywalker/Minoura as the third since they missed it in KOG

I always liked the singles lottery gimmick, so that's cool. Kikuta being in lends itself to one of the young boys beating him, but Homare's been a loss post and Cielo should beat Kato before challenging. I'd still go Cielo > Kikuta and do the Kato match in the build, even if it's a bit roundabout

That's a possibility if he wanted to go for it. It's a weird one because it seemed like they were setting up challengers for a Yuki win (most notably Kato), so unless Cielo is the guy to win the belt or a Yuki/Shun rematch, idk atm. It's thrown me because I'm stunned Yuki lost lmfaooo

I thought today was #fine, I was more in favour of Kage than Genki because Kage's been such a beast the past year, but I think he's done a really good job overall. I like my acorn to oak tree runs!

I'm more amazed on paper that we're at a V8 and we have all these bigger name opponents still to go

He's on V8, with 3 defences to go until he ties PAC's record & 4 to break. He still hasn't wrestled Dia, Dragon Kid (likely V10), Hyo, Homare, Kzy and Mochizuki Jr in defences. His growth in confidence from the beginning of his run to now is night and day. Been a big success.

The funniest part is with retaining, the few options atm to take the belt off Kikuta (minus Cielo) aren't that interesting on paper. By contrast, they've managed to book an exciting 8 month Brave reign for Ryoya, while preserving a lot of big-name opponents for the record push end of the run.

My villain origin story will be that one dude from Whatculture who said Omega should go back to working "proper matches" during the BEST OF 7 because with takes as bad as that, I'm not surprised AEW just straight up didn't care about tag wrestling for like 2 years after lmfao

The biggest misconception is that tag & trios belts take away from each other. When booked correctly, they don't. Dragongate has like 1/8th of the roster size of AEW, they book active tag and trios belts perfectly adequately and they rarely impede or hurt each other. It's not particularly difficult

Ryo Saito teach AEW how to book trios belts