Jun Akiyama left All Japan in 2000 with Mitsuharu Misawa and everyone else to form NOAH. In 2011, two years after Misawa’s tragic in-ring death, Akiyama appeared in All Japan to participate (but not do that well) in the Champion Carnival. Then he beat Suwama in a tag team match. Then he got this Triple Crown match. I dunno, sometimes wrestling angles don’t deliver the goods promised by their premise. Meh.
October 23, 2011 – Tokyo, Japan
Jun Akiyama def. Suwama {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From Pro Wrestling Love in Ryogoku Vol. 13. This didn’t click with me until pretty late into the match. Up until then the fight was fine, but watching Akiyama’s back selling lead to pretty much nothing is a sure fire way to get me annoyed that I watched a match for thirty minutes. Suwama controlled most of the match, so it was at least compelling to watch Akiyama make the comeback, but it wasn’t particularly exciting. After a bunch of exploders and lariats didn’t do the job, Akiyama hit the Sternness Dust for the win at 30:35. ***½
August 26, 2012 – Tokyo, Japan
Masakatsu Funaki def. Jun Akiyama {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the 40th Anniversary Year Summer Impact Tour. Akiyama defended the belt in NOAH, in All Japan, and on a co-promoted show with New Japan. And then he lost to Funaki here in 4:37 after Funaki hit a high kick and the Hybrid Blaster. So that’s the shortest title change of all time in All Japan. New Japan had a shorter one during their worked shoot Inokiism days. This had a bit of a worked shoot vibe to it in that Funaki was a shoot fighter, but the match at least felt like a wrestling match the whole way through. It was certainly memorable, if not long enough to be great. **½
The following January, Akiyama, Atsushi Aoki, Go Shiozaki, Kotaro Suzuki, and Yoshinobu Kanemaru all quit NOAH and joined All Japan full time. They did this out of loyalty to Kenta Kobashi, who was not re-signed by NOAH, though eventually he was given an official retirement match and ceremony.
March 17, 2013 – Tokyo, Japan
Suwama def. Masakatsu Funaki {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From Pro-Wrestling Love in Ryogoku: Basic & Dynamic. What a title! No. Funaki had some trouble in a defense against Suwama in 2012, and then made defenses that were all pretty quick. Though none as quick as his title win. This was consistent in that Funaki couldn’t put Suwama away quickly, which ultimately became his undoing. Frustratingly, they did not play that up. Instead they spent twenty minutes doing the shooter vs. wrestler thing to a dead crowd, then switched it up for the last ten minutes and dropped bombs on each other to get the fans to make some noise. Funaki didn’t play up being tired later in the match at all, and even kicked out of a really wicked Last Ride as if it were a kick out in the middle of the match. Suwama hit the backdrop driver for the win at 30:15. I’m pretty annoyed at the way a lot of this match was long for the sake of it, and kind of wish I’d just watched that last bit. But that’s not how wrestling reviews work. ***
After the incident with TARU, Mutoh had sold his controlling stake in All Japan to a promotion called Speed Partners. In June, Speed Partners installed a new president of the company, replacing Mutoh’s friend who had taken over from him when he stepped down. Mutoh resigned from All Japan out of loyalty and started his own company called Wrestle-1. But he didn’t leave alone. He took 12 guys with him. None of them were really in the Triple Crown picture, but it nevertheless gutted the company for the second time in 13 years (the third time overall, though Genichiro Tenryu and friends’ departures in 1990 didn’t take as many people away).
October 27, 2013 – Tokyo, Japan
Akebono def. Suwama {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Anniversary Tour. Suwama came to the ring wearing the new single belt representing the three belts that had always made up the Triple Crown Championship. The original belts had been sent to Matoko Baba, Giant Baba’s widow. This belt had three face plates replicating the old ones. Dory Funk Jr, President of the PWF, came out to acknowledge the new belt before the match. His slow Japanese in a southern accent is so fucking charming I can’t take it and the crowd eats it up. As for the match, woooooooooooof. Suwama acting as the transition from a shooter to a sumo wrestler sure is a bummer. Sure his reign wasn’t exactly a joke, as he got his win back from Akiyama and beat Shiozaki. I’ve hated on Akebono a lot in the past, but he was able to move around the ring reasonably well here. He looked more appropriate against another heavyweight, and looked a bit less fat than when he was in Dragon Gate. He won the inaugural Royal Road tournament to get this title shot. Now, I wouldn’t call this particularly good, but it was cool to see Suwama throw him around and surprising to see him get up so quickly after hitting big moves. He won with a piledriver at 19:33 in a shockingly anticlimactic moment. Finish aside, this was better than I expected. Akebono was pushed as a very dominant champion, defending the title multiple times in short matches (he beat Joe Doering in like two minutes) and even projected to be the first person to win the Champion Carnival as Triple Crown Champ. But during the tournament his health declined and he had to vacate the title. **¾
June 29, 2014 – Tokyo, Japan
Takao Omori def. Jun Akiyama {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Dynamite Series. Akiyama was announced as the new President of All Japan earlier in the month. These guys were a tag team at the time. Omori had left for NOAH in 2000 as well, but only lasted there a few years before bouncing to ZERO1 and then to NJPW where he semi-retired. There was basically nothing for me to hang my hat on here. I’ve never found Omori particularly interesting and this did nothing to change my opinion. They spent what felt like a lifetime building up to the Exploder vs. Ax Bomber exchange, and once we got there it played out exactly as you’d expect. Omori hit a pair of Bombers for the win at 23:20. I guess that was an upset? I don’t know. It turned out that Omori beat Ryota Hama’s record for shortest title reign not ended by injury or drugs. Seems like his reign was more of a lifetime achievement award than an actual achievement award. He lost the title 14 days later to Suwama in the, quite literally, only Triple Crown title change that I could not find anywhere. **¾
July 27, 2014 – Tokyo, Japan
Joe Doering def. Suwama {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Summer Action Series. The title bounced around a LOT this summer. I guess AJPW was looking for a Stan Hansen redux with Doering. To call this match deliberate would be generous, but they made the less-than-speedy pace work with stiff and consistent action. It probably would have played better in front of a bigger crowd going crazy for the lariats and suplexes, but if you can handle a match going the same speed for twenty minutes, this won’t bore you. Doering hit a Revolution Bomb for the win at 21:11. ***½
January 3, 2015 – Tokyo, Japan
Go Shiozaki def. Joe Doering {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From New Year Wars. I accidentally watched a mislabeled match of theirs from Doering’s first defense against Shiozaki in October. Shiozaki won the Royal Road tournament and also pinned Doering in a tag team match, so his credentials for that match were pretty solid. Also that match ruled so I have high hopes for this one. After that match was over, Doering told Shiozaki they could go one more time, and then Shiozaki pinned him in another tag match in December. In the last match, Doering was too powerful and resilient for the smaller (but way more beautiful) Shiozaki at every turn. I was worried that this match would see Shiozaki triumph just because Doering wasn’t bringing the goods like he did in October. But then nothing Shiozaki did was putting Doering away and he started surviving by the skin of his teeth by avoiding the Revolution Bomb as much as he could. I really liked the way they protected that move here. When all the fancy moves that took too long for Shiozaki to set up and were expending too much energy, he caught a dazed Doering with a series of lariats for the win at 23:15. This pairing works really well. Shiozaki joined Misawa, Akiyama, Yoshihiro Takayama, Kenta Kobashi, Akira Taue, and Kensuke Sasaki as guys who had won the GHC and Triple Crown Championship. Minoru Suzuki joined him a couple months later when he won the GHC belt. ****
May 21, 2015 – Tokyo, Japan
Akebono def. Go Shiozaki {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Super Power Series. Oops, this sucked. This was what I worried the match against Suwama would be like. That wasn’t a disaster, but this was. Akebono didn’t sell anything from Shiozaki, the match went on forever and ever anyway, and the big man did not move around the ring very well. By the end I just felt bad for Shiozaki, who had put in such awesome efforts against bigger men on his way to the title only to be treated like this here. What can ya do? I guess the guy was probably pretty over at the time but man oh man the match was bad. Akebono hit an arm-trapped piledriver for the win at 21:29. *½
November 1, 2015 – Hirosaki, Aomori
Jun Akiyama def. Akebono {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Power of Wrestling Charity Show. This was also bad, but at least it had Akebono taking some offense and panicking before falling at the end. At least there was a compelling story, or rather, a story that would have been compelling if both competitors have a full range of mobility. Akiyama won this one with an exploder at 13:16. Sort of. I mean, there was no way Akebono wasn getting off of his feet for the move, so he sort of did a half somersault to his side to take the bump. Both Akebono and Shiozaki before him made successful title defenses against Kento Miyohara and Zeus, two guys who were being groomed to be the next generation at the top of the card. After this, Akebono teamed with Motoko Baba to form his own company. It ran for two years, but then Akebono started having crippling heart problems and by many accounts he’s in a very depressing state today. Here’s hoping he gets better. **
January 2, 2016 – Tokyo, Japan
Suwama def. Jun Akiyama {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From New Years Two Days. The coolest bit in this match was Akiyama driving Suwama’s throat into the guardrail, Suwama panicking, and then Akiyama targeting the throat from time to time. They abandoned that, sadly, and went hard at each other with exploders and knee kicks and suplexes and lariats instead. It was hard-hitting and exciting, but to throw away an interesting story in favor for the old reliable same same was disappointing to see. I thought at first this would exceed their 2011 match (which I think people overrated at the time), but it was pretty much on par. Suwama hit a backdrop driver for the win at 24:19. ***½
Suwama got hurt, probably in the title match, and vacated the belt ten days later. Shiozaki had gone back to NOAH and Akebono had started his own group. Others had decided to leave too because of the way All Japan restructured the wrestlers’ contracts. Rather than going back to the well of President Akiyama or foreigner Doering as champ again, All Japan pulled the trigger on their young guns. It was an interesting choice. Historically, All Japan had only pushed home-grown talent to the top. Even their gaijin champions tended to be very loyal to All Japan. But the new batch of wrestlers they had moved toward the top were culled from Japanese indies. You had the smaller Miyahara from Kensuke Office, the giants Zeus & Bodyguard from Osaka Pro, and the deathmatch wrestler Shuji Ishikawa from DDT and Big Japan at the top of the list. The injury to Suwama opened the door for them to reign.
February 12, 2016 – Tokyo, Japan
Kento Miyahara def. Zeus {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Excite Series. Miyahara broke Terry Gordy’s record by becoming the youngest Triple Crown Champion ever, and he didn’t overdose on drugs after his win either. So two records. Sadly, having two young guys on top meant that the show didn’t draw and fewer than 1,000 people were in attendance for this match at Korakuen Hall. This was a spry match to be sure, and a good power vs. speed battle. My issue in the end is that Miyahara also used power to get the win in the end against his larger opponent, which makes for a less compelling story. He hit the Shutdown Suplex for the win at 23:20. ***½
May 21, 2017 – Tokyo, Japan
Shuji Ishikawa def. Kento Miyahara {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Super Power Series. Ishikawa beat Doering in the finals of the Champion Carnival to earn this shot. This was a hundred times more fast-paced than anything All Japan had put on in a main event in forever, maybe ever (in terms of title changes anyway). Miyahara had to fight from behind the whole match as Ishikawa ran through him with a dickish smirk on his face. I loved that. In the end, Ishikawa caught him going for a running knee and lifted him up for the Giant Slam for the win at 20:38. Okay, now I’m looking forward to seeing Ishikawa’s matches for the DDT and BJW titles when I get to those. ****
August 27, 2017 – Tokyo, Japan
Kento Miyahara def. Shuji Ishikawa {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the 45th Anniversary Show. This show drew over 6,000, which isn’t a lot in the grand scheme but feels like a lot given the small crowds I’ve been seeing here. This had everything the last match had, but also had the added drama of Miyahara knowing that he was outmatched by the larger and more grizzled champion. Ishikawa bullied Miyahara throughout the match. But this time his smile was gone, replaced with a viciousness he didn’t have last time. At one point, he held Miyahara up by the hair and pummeled him with obscene elbows to the face. Miyahara desperately countered a V Trigger to one of his own and then strung together enough offense to hit the Shutdown Suplex for the win at 24:40. ****½
October 9, 2017 – Tokyo, Japan
Suwama def. Kento Miyahara {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Raising An Army Memorial Series. Suwama won the Royal Road tournament to get this shot. AJPW had given Miyahara a win over Suwama during his first title reign to cement him as a top guy. I understand that, but it would have been cool given Suwama takes the title from him quickly here had Miyahara never beaten him yet. I don’t know why I haven’t mentioned this yet but the women in the crowd are rabid for Miyahara, so at least AJPW was getting the ladies interested again. Okay, so now I see that the throat/jaw attack against the barricade is just an All Japan thing that happens all the time and never amounts to anything. That’s lame. That aside, I had a lot of fun with this. Miyahara was desperate the entire match because Suwama was rolling him. He’d have these bursts where he’d be in control because his knee kicks could connect from any direction, but he could never string together offense to get close to a win and he never came close to hitting the Shutdown Suplex. In the end, Suwama obliterated him with a lariat, a backdrop driver, and the Last Ride at 31:03. One thing I especially liked was that Suwama goes for real pins after the Last Ride (which works) whereas Ishikawa goes for weak pins after Splash Mountain (which never works). ****
October 21, 2017 – Yokohama, Kanagawa
Joe Doering def. Suwama {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Jun Akiyama and Takao Omori Debut 25th Anniversary Show. I think this might be the first time that two wrestlers in a row lost the Triple Crown in their first defense. Don’t hold me to that. Doering is channeling Bruiser Brody more than Hansen here with his furry boots. There was very little to get invested in here. The match was technically fine but there was very little drama. The crowd didn’t care at all. The action wasn’t consistent enough to be engaging. It also felt like Doering’s Revolution Bomb for the win at 20:10 came out of nowhere. I liked their first match better. ***
March 25, 2018 – Saitama, Saitama
Kento Miyahara def. Joe Doering {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Dream Power Series. Doering cut off Miyahara’s early match ringside nonsense, so that was a nice change of pace. I also liked the ease with which Doering shrugged off the first Shutdown Suplex attempt. When the match was in the ring, Doering was in control. He just casually dominated. The finish was flukey, which is probably good because there’s no reason not to keep Doering Strong. Miyahara hit a lucky knee kick and then used that brief opening to hit the Shutdown Suplex for the win at 17:34. So this both made Doering look like a strong guy who got unlucky and made the Shutdown look like a world-ender. Not the most exciting match, but it accomplished those things. ***¼
July 29, 2018 – Osaka, Osaka
Zeus def. Kento Miyahara {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Summer Action Series. These two were 1-1-1 in singles matches coming into this. And [sigh] this didn’t work. They didn’t have the goods to fill the crazy long match time. It was repetitive, boring, and felt like it lasted forever. Basically nothing at all happened for the first ten minutes. The second ten were a low key version of the final ten, and it felt like the same match happened twice on a loop. The crowd was dead for all but the final few minutes. I don’t understand what the story was even supposed to be. Why were they so evenly matched? And why did everything Zeus did feel so rehearsed? That was a very long thirty minutes. Zeus won at 29:36 with a Jackhammer. I guess some of the near falls were good but I felt myself chalking that up to wanting the match to end. **¼
October 21, 2018 – Yokohama, Kanagawa
Kento Miyahara def. Zeus {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Raising An Army Memorial Series. I’ve heard this is the better of the two matches, so my fingers are crossed very tightly. Despite being a bit longer, this was definitely paced better than the match from July. Things picked up earlier and didn’t let up after that. Miyahara had an intensity and desperation in his attitude that was totally missing from the last match too. Zeus looked more comfortable in his role as well. He also kicked out of the a Shutdown Suplex, which I haven’t seen yet (though someone may have kicked out of it before this because it wasn’t met with that much awe) and which added to the feeling that he was out of Miyahara’s league at this point. Miyahara kicking out of a Jackhammer felt less believable. But then Miyahara knocked Zeus silly and caught him with another one at 34:00 for the win. I think some people feel about the Johnny Gargano vs. Adam Cole matches the way I feel about this match. I felt a lot of the big near falls existed just to make the match feel long and artificially epic. I felt the NXT matches did it much more naturally than this. ***½
March 23, 2020 – Tokyo, Japan
Suwama def. Kento Miyahara {Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match}
From the Dream Power Series. Miyahara held the belt for 17 months and wiped out the entire upper card. I think if it were me, I might have had Jake Lee beat Miyahara for the title because he’s a fresh face and anyone else beating Miyahara is a bit regressive. Plus, if you’re not drawing that many fans anyway, why not try something new? So yeah, Suwama as champion again. In fact, with this win he became a dual champion, as he and Ishikawa were tag champs already. On the bright side, the match was dope. It was much more even than the last match I saw from these two, which makes sense because in the meantime Miyahara had defeated Suwama a couple of times. Suwama seemed to learn from past mistakes, as down the stretch he didn’t bother going for a pin after a backdrop driver and hit a second one before attempting it. That got two and Miyahara blocked a third attempt by going to the eyes. Suwama powered through and hit a third backdrop driver for the win at 31:25. ****
Two weeks later, Japan went on lockdown because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Unlike New Japan, AJPW ran shows the entire time in empty arenas. I guess if you were having trouble drawing crowds before the pandemic it doesn’t look that bad to put on shows in front of zero fans. Still, it’s hard not to see Akiyama’s time at the top of All Japan as a failure, as cost-cutting measures that affected the talent (the very thing that caused Akiyama to leave NOAH in protest over) and dwindling crowds were a staple of his tenure.
From Diamond Ring Kensuke Office Changes. They emphasize that Nakajima beat Dragon Gate wrestler Kenichiro Arai 
From Dynamite 131. This is a qualifying match for the Owen Hart Foundation tournament. Joe debuted at ROH Supercard of Honor, saving Jonathan Gresham from Jay Lethal (whose soul searching apparently led him to turn heel) & Sonjay Dutt after the main event. And now that ROH and AEW are the same thing, that seems worth mentioning. Caster’s pre-match rap was cute. This was real squashy, with Joe needing only two minutes to put Caster down with the Muscle Buster at 2:52. Lethal & Dutt pop up on the big screens and Lethal says he’d been trying to get a hold of Joe during his difficult soul searching time, and Joe never picked up. They have a present for Joe next week. N/A
From Dynamite 132. Jay Lethal & Sonjay Dutt were in the front row cheering on Joe. Sarcastically, probably, as they brawled with Joe at ROH Supercard of Honor XV. 
From Rampage 39. 
From Dynamite 137. 
From Dynamite 138. This is a 
From Double or Nothing. 
From PWF York Cougar Football Fundraiser. I didn't know that this match happened until over a month after the fact. This started out as a non-title match, but we'll get to why I've listed it as a title match in a moment. FTR have Mick Foley in their corner while their opponents have Bill Behrens. I’ve never actually seen Behrens do an on-camera gig before. He's holding a tennis racket, presumably as an Umaga to Jim Cornette. But it's confusing because there was actually a tennis player named Bill Behrens. They announce this match as having a 20-minute time limit. Only 11 minutes in, they say there are three minutes remaining. Until then, this was as run-of-the-mill as a modern FTR match gets. But the announcement snapped everyone out of their heat-on-Wheeler funk and forced them to go for desperate pins. They announce ten seconds remaining a couple of times, but no one can get the roll up pin they're looking for. The 20-minute time limit expires at 1
From NXT UK 183. McGuinness started by essentially saying that Fraser is going to pee or poo himself during the match. Unnecessary. Had Shawn Michaels been game to have a good match against Vader, this is what it would have looked like. Actually, a more appropriate and modern analogue is Brock Lesnar vs. Seth Rollins from SummerSlam. Much like that match, Frazer used quick strikes and avoided his larger opponent’s signature big move to stay alive. Here it was the powerbomb whereas there it was suplexes. Here, Frazer also successfully damaged WALTER’s knee, which slowed the big man down and made it hard for WALTER to hit the powerbomb. Unfortunately for Frazer, WALTER was able to bide his time and clothesline Frazer’s legs out from under him. An inevitable powerbomb followed and won the match for WALTER at 14:02. I hate to say this because I’m happy that he’s healthier, but the way WALTER has slimmed down has taken some of the magic away from his aura. At least for me it has. That said, dude can clearly still go as well as ever in the ring. ****
From NXT 659. Strong was feeling it here, which is thanks in large part to the crowd being maniacally loud from the get go I’m sure. His whole game was fast and devastating stick and move attacks. That worked pretty well, as WALTER was dazed from time to time. But as with all good WALTER matches (which is pretty much all WALTER matches), everything WALTER does is devastating here so it takes very little for him to take back control. And eventually he did just that and hit the powerbomb for the win at 9:46 (shown of 12:18). After the match, WALTER gets on the microphone and says that his name is Gunther now. I did not think WALTER would be a victim of the renaming curse this far into his run. What will they rename Strong?! ***¾
From NXT UK 185. Andy Shepherd helpfully announces from inside the ring that the reason for the stipulation is that the feud has gotten so violent that it wouldn’t be safe to have fans around. Devlin says during the match that it’s because he thinks Dragunov could only muster the energy to win if he had the crowd behind him. I like that explanation a lot more. The only real reason I could think of to do this without fans is that there was a scheduling conflict with one of the wrestlers for the regular TV taping date and they needed to get this thing filmed. We just had such a long stretch of empty arena NXT UK episodes that I can’t imagine anyone was dying to get another taste of it. This aired the day after Adam Cole vs. Orange Cassidy in a match that was also no disqualification and falls count anywhere, and this served up everything I felt was missing from that match. Now you might say, “Brad, Cassidy is not the same kind of character as Devlin or Dragunov, how could you expect the same level of violence or intensity?” To that I say, when Cassidy started his match by breaking his own sunglasses and rapidly punching Cole, he was indicating that level of violence and/or intensity. And instead the match was mostly wacky. Anyway, this was not wacky. It was stiff and intense and featured weapons that made sense and spots the didn’t take forever to set up. Dragunov got in trouble when his eye injury acted up. Devlin took control and beat the crap out of him. I wasn’t wild about how meek Dragunov was when Devlin was zip tying his hands, but I did like that in the end it turned out to be an error on Devlin’s part anyway because Dragunov’s finisher requires no hands. And indeed, a bound Dragunov jumped off the steel steps (which had been brought into the ring) and hit the Torpedo Moskau on Devlin for the win at 21:43. NXT UK is still sneaking in these dope matches that no one is watching. Y’all should watch them. ****¼ 
From AAA Triplemania Regia. FTR come out with Vickie Guerrero. This was supposed to be explained at an earlier AAA taping but FTR and Guerrero all missed them. AAA is notorious for having this kind of luck/being incompetent lately. FTR is also wearing Eddie Guerrero tribute tights, with American flags on one side and flames on the other, I suppose to pay homage to his Gringos Locos and Latino Heat gimmicks. This match mostly sucked, but one cool spot saw FTR tie Pentagon’s mask to the ropes and force him to unmask with his hands over his face to stop them from climbing the ladder. That would have been a very meaningful moment to lead up to the Lucha Brothers winning the titles back, but unfortunately instead it led into nothing. He just got his mask back and the match continued on in its lame, derivative way. At one point, Pentagon was the only man standing, but instead of climbing the ladder he grabbed a table from the floor. So the titles mean enough to him that he’d unmask to stop his opponents from winning, but not enough for him to get the titles when he had a clear path to do it? Vickie powered Pentagon, causing him to voluntarily jump through the table and Harwood grabbed the belts at 12:12. This was abysmal. *
From AEW Full Gear. Silver was hamming it up a lot more here than he was the year before in New York. That said, this had stronger just-a-match vibes than the aforementioned match. After Silver ripped out Cassidy’s pockets, Cassidy turned up the heat and these guys put on a middle of the row undercard match. Not bad by any means, but nothing memorable either. Cassidy hit the Beach Break rather out of nowhere for the win at 9:42. **¾ 
From the second Honor Reigns Supreme. The commentators sold this as Gresham getting a big shot against a top ROH guy after being an also-ran in the Television Championship division for a while. This was terrific. Both guys did a fantastic job selling their respective targeted limbs, and Gresham in particular played the role of the tenacious underdog perfectly. He didn’t just watch to see where Lethal would have trouble executing his finisher because of the damage he’d done to the former ROH Champion’s arm, he pressed the assault whenever he could, taking out the arm to make sure the Lethal Injection would never come. But what he couldn’t do was stop Lethal from battering his knee and ultimately winning with a Figure 4 Leglock at 17:54. ****¼ 
From the second Masters of the Craft. Columbus has way more Gresham fans than Concord did. That’s a neat little advancement to the plot, innit? They both went after the same limbs that earned them dividends in their previous match. And then they went ahead and built an incredible match out of that story. At first it seemed as though Lethal wasn’t going to be able to get Gresham’s leg to give out. But about halfway through the match, Gresham’s knee was in trouble. Gresham was able to escape the leglock this time by using the momentum of Lethal pulling him away from the ropes to shift to an armbar. But Gresham’s focus on the arm bit him in the ass. Lethal went for the Lethal Injection and collapsed again, but when Gresham went for a roll up after that Lethal cut back on it for the win at 18:27. This is one of the best American examples that I've seen of a match building on the match that came before. Rather than try to outdo the maneuvers from their first meeting for the sake of a big crowd reaction, they adjust their game plans in logical ways that, to me, were just as exciting. I think this match is slept on, by virtue of the fact that I’ve never heard anything about it before watching it. ****½ 
From ROH Wrestling 364. In real life, 
From Death Before Dishonor XVII. Gresham and Lethal had been teaming, but Gresham grew frustrated and started heeling. Ultimately, he turned on Lethal. It took them a little while to get there, but once they got into a groove this was exactly what I wanted from this match. It was back to their old tricks, with Lethal targeting the leg to set up for the Figure 4 Leglock and Gresham targeting the arm to block the Lethal Injection and set up for his Octopus. In the end, Lethal tried the cutback trick that worked for him in Columbus, but Gresham countered to a pin and then put on the gnarliest Octopus for his first win over Lethal at 17:20. This is the best kind of wrestling series. And none of it felt stale because it was a year after they’d wrestled last and because they found ways to energize the old tropes. And that’s not to mention Gresham busting out what I can only describe as a sumo-style assault. Gresham and Lethal make up after the match. ****
From ROH Wrestling 500. During the pandemic, ROH made the most of their empty arena shows by kicking them off with a tournament to crown a champion for the revived Pure Championship. Gresham won the tournament, and this was his fourth defense of the title. Lethal and Gresham were still allies here. In an interesting move, the other match on this milestone episode was two other partners fighting in Jay and Mark Briscoe. They cut to a commercial break about six minutes in, though the action didn’t get beyond (admittedly fast-moving) mat wrestling until the 10-minute mark. That had me thinking this was going to go long, but things took a different turn. Both guys had abused the other’s shoulders, and Lethal used that to his advantage best. He forced Gresham to use his first rope break to stop a pin, and his second to escape a crab. Then, he used the failed Lethal Injection to bait Gresham into a crossface, forcing the champ to use his final rope break. But he made the mistake of giving Gresham a breather and was quickly caught in a head scissor takedown giving Gresham the winning pin at 14:06 (shown of 16:40). For an empty arena match, this held my attention. It was totally different than their previous matches while still using a couple elements from the rivalry to elevate it just a bit. Not essential viewing, but if you’re working your way through their series you shouldn’t skip it. ***¼ 
