New Japan Pro Wrestling
Best of Super Juniors 27 – Night 2
November 18, 2020
Korakuen Hall
Tokyo Japan

Watch: NJPW World
Best of the Super Juniors Preview: voicesofwrestling.com/2020/11/11/njpw-best-of-the-super-juniors-27-preview-schedule/

After a combined breezy show last Sunday, now we are up for Night 2 action with the Super Jrs alone. Today the exciting main event is Hiromu Takahashi against El Desperado, a combination that I’m always pumped to see due to their chemistry and amazing past matches. On Night 1 we saw Hiromu stealing the show with a win over the Jr. champ, Taiji Ishimori, and Desperado had a loss against Taguchi. Will El Desperado be able to take an advantage in the tournament against the favorite to win the whole thing?

Robbie Eagles came back hot with a win against DOUKI, so we’ll see if he can stack another win against Master Wato. Will this be the night where Yuya Uemura, the exciting Young Lion, gets an upset win? Will Taguchi upset the champ Ishimori and rack up a win and a possible opportunity for the Jr belt? Keep reading to find out what happened and what’s worth going out of your way to see. 

Tomoaki Honma & Satoshi Kojima def. Gabriel Kidd & Yuji Nagata

Kojima possibly has the best entrance theme, in my opinion. Opening action are the NJPW Dads with a Young Lion. This was your standard decent opening tag. Kidd showed a lot of fire and was a great foil for Kojima and Honma, with his fire offense and selling. This match was a great showcase for him, especially during the final minutes. It ended when Kidd ate one of Kojima’s lariats. As an opener to fire the crowd up this match worked, and these are always fun to see. Still, nothing special, you already know what to get with these matches. ***

Best of the Super Juniors 27
BUSHI (2) def. Yuya Uemura (0)

My favorite Young Lion against my least favorite member of LIJ. Started fast with Yuya trying to get a fast pin on BUSHI with nonstop attempts and nonstop attacks. BUSHI stopped all of that action with a dropkick and proceeded to dominate the match. BUSHI applied a Boston Crab, Yuya got to the rope, and then Yuya answered it back with a Boston Crab of his own. I liked Yuya’s strategy throughout the match of hitting a big move and then a pin attempt. BUSHI countered one of his moves with a Code Breaker for a 2. Alas, it was not enough since BUSHI hit another move and it was over. Yuya is still without a BOSJ win and the match is ***.

Best of the Super Juniors 27
Master Wato (4) Def. Robbie Eagles (2)

Cool as hell Eagles vs Not so cool as hell Wato. Eagles is so cool that he got the cloud clapping by ironically clapping Wato’s hand on a hold. It started with the standard feeling out process which ended with both doing the kip up, and Wato almost failing while doing it. A tope con hilo to the outside from Eagles got him a two. Wato did two impressive high flying moves that got him the advantage. I think there was a botch by Wato where Eagles almost had a bad landing, you can be the judge of that, but they recovered. There was an awesome kick sequence which worked in Eagles favor, since he is working a leg submission lately. Still, it was not enough for Eagles, since after an exciting finishing sequence, Wato won from the top rope. This was a good match. Eagles as always was amazing, but Wato needs to work on some things. I have not been feeling Wato at all and his look does not help. Still,  fun action, ***½

Best of the Super Juniors 27
SHO (4) Def. DOUKI (0)

Nice of Douki to always be taking care of the wrestlers by wearing a mask. The match started fast with Douki attacking SHO when he entered the ring. SHO countered by throwing him outside, but decided to not throw DOUKI into the rail since he is fair. This did not work since DOUKI is a dick and he proceeded to throw SHO into the rail and hit him with his stick. Usual DOUKI stuff, you know. When the bullshit criteria was checked off the list, there was a great match between these two. 

DOUKI dominated with kicks and submissions and SHO fired back with power moves. After a back and forth sequence of swinging momentum, SHO applied 3 powerbombs, but it was not enough. SHO went for his piledriver and DOUKI countered with his arms and neck submission. SHO was able to stand DOUKI’s attacks, but he had to do two piledrivers back to back to get another win in the tournament. Great match and my favorite DOUKI match in NJPW so far. Great back and forth action that never let up. If you are a DOUKI fan, check it out. Nothing amazing, but great solid bullshit-free action (outside of the beginning). ***1/2

Best of the Super Juniors 27
Taiji Ishimori (2) Def. Ryusuke Taguchi (2)

I always enjoy Taguchi, and I loved that Ishimori went outside because he could not stand his dancing to the tune of the claps from the crowd. Ishimori went back in and did the running the rope spot with Taguchi, with Taguchi getting the upper hand. Momentum was turned and Ishimori took Taguchi to the outside. Talking about Taguchi’s awesomeness, Ishimori took him back to the ring and Ishimori had to stop him from rolling slowly to the outside. The match was slowed down with a headlock and with Ishimori working Taguchi’s head and chopping him. Alas, a butt attack gave the match back to Taguchi and he started working Ishimori’s leg. At this moment it became a match of Ishimori’s working Taguchi’s head and Taguchi’s Ishimori’s leg. Yet, the match ended with a surprise roll-up by Ishimori where he got hold of Taguchi’s tights and we had Taguchi’s ass on the screen for the next 5 minutes. Decent match, but nothing special and not must see. Funny in moments with some good sequences. ***

Best of the Super Juniors 27
El Desperado (2) Def. Hiromu Takahashi (2)

Here we go! One of my most anticipated matches of this tournament. These guys always tear the house down. This time they started with a test of strength in the middle of the ring, but immediately went nuts when Hiromu threw Desperado to the outside to throw him into the rails. They came back to the ring and started beating the shit out of each other. Glorious violence

This was a back and forth action of two opponents who don’t like each other just trying to one up one another. Those opening 5 minutes are amazing. 

Desperado started working on Hiromu’s legs, and Hiromu just tried to kill the man however he could. With less movements from Hiromu, he had to rely on strikes, which gave us a sequence of chops in the middle of the ring, which ended with a kick to the legs of Hiromu. Hiromu swinged momentum to his side, and not even Desperado using Red Shoes to evade Hiromu’s strikes worked. Desperado started applying Numero Dos, which took Hiromu to his breaking point and gave the advantage to Desperado. A Pinche Loco was reversed into Dynamite Plunger to an exposed turnbuckle, but nothing could be done due to a ref bump. Desperado, obviously, went to the outside to look for a chair, beat the shit out of Hiromu’s knee, applied Numero Dos, and made Hiromu tap out in the middle of the ring. 

This match was my shit. Amazing glorious violence, great leg work by Hiromu, hate between two opponents. Even the ref bump did not bother me and was in character with Desperado. This is easily ****. Check this out. 

Final Thoughts

In just two hours of running time, Best of the Super Juniors 27 Night 2 was a solid night of wrestling action. There’s nothing must see that came out of this show, but it was a really easy watch and I really enjoyed DOUKI vs SHO and Hiromu and Desperado had another great main event. The show was short, sweet, had good action, and a great main event. I would only recommend checking it out if you are craving for more wrestling this week. If you don’t have much time but still want some Jr action in your day, go straight to the main event.