Tonight's Dragon Gate USA PPV!!!

[SDC Da Polar Bear]

Who's all watching or will be in the future? If they do make it into 2011, you know they'll be coming to Atlanta during Wrestlemania weekend! Of course that means having to choose between them and ROH.

[Larry Goodman]

I bought the first two. Passed on the third and hadn't decided about this one. I'm curious to hear your thoughts after viewing it.

[SDC Da Polar Bear]

Well, I watched the PPV last night, and I gotta say it was a solid show, but not on the level of their first show (which I attended by the way). Still, being heavy on solid wrestling action and light on video vignettes and promos, you get a better show for $19.95 than you would a lot of times with WWE or TNA- you know what, for anyone thinking of getting TNA Sacrifice tomorrow or WWE Over The Edge, just spare the money and get this show here! Trust me, it's worth it. Mercury Rising has a replay of the PPV scheduled for this Sunday at 1pm, so I'll try to explain what happened here without spoilers.

The opening match was Shingo, who is one of my personal favorites in the Dragon Gate roster, against Genki Horiguchi. This was exactly what an opening match should be- exciting enough to get the crowd into the show, but not too much to where it takes away from the efforts of the rest of the matches. Shingo is a compact muscular guy with charisma, power moves and stiff striking ability, while Horiguchi is a 12-year veteran with quickness and a tremendous upside. He has unintentionally developed a gimmick where the fans chant at him "H-A-G-E", which translated means bald, a reference to his receding hairline, but rather than letting it upset him, he has used to to gain popularity, turning a negative into a positive. Both men represented their respective stables here, with Shingo representing WORLD-1 (not to be confused with Jody Peterman's group) and Horiguchi representing the WARRIORS (not to be confused with the gang from Brooklyn-can you dig it!). This match as I said was a good back-and-forth encounter, with Shingo dominating the majority of the match with his power game and a wealth of submissions. Horiguchi was game though, and showed his wile with quick comebacks and escapability.

They did a video package that chronicled the feud between Brian Kendrick and Jimmy Jacobs. There was supposed to be a promo from Teddy Hart, but given that Hart's promo was said to be a nonsensical one, DGUSA cut that one out. The package did show that they chose tag team partners for what would be a Loser of The fall Leaves Town match, with Kendrick choosing Paul London and Jacobs choosing Jack Evans.

While not giving away winners and losers, if you know how TNA operates, you can pretty much guess who took the fall here. The match, while fine in spots and doing a good job of leading to Kendrick and Jacobs having their final confrontation, lacked the kind of proper execution you would expect from these two. London in particular was, both in ring shape and in-ring work, a far cry from his days in WWE and Ring Of Honor, and I sincerely hope he finds the fire he once had.

They showed footage from the Fearless PPV when Jon Moxley called out Tommy Dreamer. Moxley is the current FIP and CZW heavyweight champion, and is a 6'4" 230 specimen trained by our own Les Thatcher. He brings intensity and a surprising ability to work the mic. Good job, Les!

Tommy Dreamer cut a promo thanking the fans for their support. He mentioned that he faced Tajiri the night before in Japan for Tajiri's SMASH Pro Wrestling promotion. He alluded to his "stroke" with Gabe Sapolsky, and because of it, we have a No Rules match with Tommy Dreamer "violence".

This match works because it's a very different type of match from the rest of the card, and because Dreamer is over with the crowd everything he looked to accomplish in this match went well. It wasn't a classic by any means, but Moxley was put over well, and hey, we got a little blood and violence out of the deal! There were run-ins from a few, including some chick with spiky hair, but not too many that took away from the match itself.

The co-feature match was next. This was a match for the Open The Dream Gate Championship, with YAMATO, a member of the Kamikaze stable, defending the title he won from Naruki Doi a week prior in Tokyo against Susumu Yokozuka. YAMATO is a cocky heel that has great technical wrestling skills, while Yokozuka has long been associated with heel factions in Dragon Gate until recently, bringing that dynamic to this match. Depending on your tastes in wrestling, this match had a couple of moments in the match where spots were immediately no-sold, leading you to either hate that part or love the FIGHTING SPIRIT that was displayed. Being that this is a website that generally emphasizes Southern-style wrestling, it may be looked down upon, but personally I grew up watching All-Japan from the 90's, where that type of thing was commonplace in main events and added to the intensity of the match, so it didn't bother me in the least- in fact, I thought this was one of the best matches of the evening, and certainly better than some other title matches that have been on pay-per-view in other companies.

Now to the signature style of match from Dragon Gate, the main event six-man tag. This pitted the WORLD-1 faction of BxB Hulk, a charismatic and athletic guy with a great look and the current Open The Freedom Gate Champion, winning it at the Freedom Fight PPV in Philadelphia in a tourney final over YAMATO, and the team of Speed & Muscle- Masato Yoshino, the speed element of the team, AND I DO MEAN SPEED, and the aforementioned Naruki Doi, the leader of the WORLD-1 faction and with the best physique of anyone in the match. Their opposition was WARRIORS, consisting of Gamma, who carries a kendo stick and ain't afraid to use it!, Dragon Kid, who automatically draws comparisons to a younger Rey Misterio Jr., is one of the most experienced wrestlers on the roster and even had a few matches in WCW, defeating the late Eddie Guerrero on Nitro, and CIMA, who is the franchise player of Dragon Gate. Wow, I write LONG sentences! Anyway, this one doesn't exactly top the last 3 six-man tags from Wrestlemania weekends past, but it certainly will go down as one of the best matches of the year, and in my opinion worth the $19.95 alone!