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Good morning, everyone! Happy Tuesday!
Today I present my first New Japan Pro Wrestling Wrestle Kingdom 17 match review.
Will Ospreay vs Kenny Omega for the IWGP United States Championship.
I was emotionally invested in Will Ospreay vs Kenny Omega just on the little bad blood interaction that emerge and their names alone. Both men have solidified their names in this business. So, I honestly didn’t need an absolute fundamental story of hero vs villain or baby face vs heel. Kenny Omega did a wonderful job as the villain, and he was deeply rooted in remaining as such while Will Ospreay tried to make this match very fight feel with humanity weaved into it.
Kenny Omega revealed in an interview that before he left in New Japan in 2019 and now, we know he helped started AEW. But before that, he pulled Jay White and Will Ospreay aside and told them that New Japan is going to need people to step up while he’s gone.
Think of this as the time John Cena tells the story of how he got his spotlight position when he mentions that he grabbed the brass nuts since Vince McMahon was looking for a new star.
Anyway. Jay White is the first to shoot down that rumor. Will Ospreay remembered that talk and immediately had mentioned his disdain for Kenny Omega some years after that when Omega threw Ospreay under the bus during a twitter confrontation. Then Ospreay and the United Empire appeared on AEW TV to which, of course, Omega being an EVP had to get the last word in during their promo battle.
What I didn’t like was the constant, you couldn’t fill my shoes. Will Ospreay is leaps and bounds better than Kenny Omega thus making Will Ospreay vastly unique. Kenny Omega is known for wrestling in the states but on the indies. He had a tryout with WWE long long long ago but is known for the indies. He then moved to Japan and started in DDT (Dream Dramatic Team) where he met Kota Ibushi — his Golden Lover teammate — and then Kota Ibushi brought in Kenny Omega to New Japan Pro Wrestling. While at NJPW, Kenny won various titles, feuded with Okada (those are the ONLY matches we ever talk about), and was once the leader of Bullet Club while forming The Elite (Kenny Omega, Nick Jackson, Matt Jackson) in the club.
Will Ospreay matured and accepted his flaws and past mistakes. You can’t change the past; you can learn from it, however. Will Ospreay gave his life to New Japan Pro Wrestling. Literally. While IWGP World Heavyweight Champion, he fought Shingo Takagi and Shingo did his Made in Japan move through a table which broke Ospreay’s neck.
The same injury Big E is dealing with is similar to what Ospreay had. Luckly, both are going to be ok. After that horrible accident, Ospreay had a near death kidney infection that he survived. Ospreay had to travel 15+ hour flights from the UK to Japan that were rerouted because of the war in Ukraine and then having to stay in quarantine for 14 days even with a doctor’s note explaining he was negative for Covid.
Kenny could drive to and from Jacksonville Florida to tape All Elite Wrestling shows with little restrictions. So, for Kenny to make the last promo battle between the two about Kota Ibushi and how Will Ospreay knocked out Ibushi with the debut of the Hidden Blade (elbow to the head strike) back in 2019 at Wrestle Kingdom 13 and that hurt Kenny, was lame. No one was going to remember that specific detail and that’s Kenny Omega playing towards the built-in fans rather than the wider audience of fans.
And so, after 4 years of no interaction with New Japan Pro Wrestling, Kenny Omega can waltz into a house that Will Ospreay carried through a pandemic and nearly died for to spoiler: become the new IWGP United States Champion.
I understand that wrestling is supposed to be our escape from sometimes a miserable life. You get yelled at during your shift, come home and watch wrestling with larger-than-life characters. You have debt to repay but don’t know how? Come home and watch wrestling with larger-than-life characters, and you’ll figure something out. Wrestling is an escape so most of the time I don’t mind a defined baby face vs heel story. However, the bad blood between Will Ospreay and Kenny Omega should have just been:
Real
No bullshit
Kenny Omega is good, but he can’t improv. Kenny Omega is good but after the whole AEW All Out Brawl…there’s something I’m noticing and not liking.
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