The Race for Wrestler of the Year: September 2018

The Wrestler of the Month: Kazuchika Okada, Okada has been on a tear the entire year but now that he doesn’t have to keep the IWGP Championship schedule he was on, he has a lot more freedom to wrestle where he wants. He had an amazing match against Marty Scurrl at All in getting a ****3/4 star rating, had a MOTY contender against Hiroshi Tanahashi at NJPW Destruction in Kobe getting a ***** star rating, and capped off his month in one of the best tag matches I’ve ever seen teaming up against Tomohiro Ishii to face the Golden Lovers grabbing another ***** star rating. Kazuchika Okada went absolutely mental this month and made 3 separate excursions into the US in a span of a month.

Women’s Wrestler of the Month: Becky Lynch, Lynch has been on a roll for a long time and has finally been booked correctly and this month it finally came into action as she beat Charlotte for the Smackdown Women’s Title in a good match. The achievement of winning the title isn’t all that got her Women’s Wrestler of the month, her character as a heel who’s been out of the spotlight is very refreshing and in WWE’s current landscape a refreshing character is a great thing. 

Match of the Month: Kazuchika Okada and Tomohiro Ishii vs the Golden Lovers, I’m normally someone who wants to put a great match with a storyline over a match with a better in-ring performance but that went the opposite way this month. Up until 3 days ago, when this match happened, I thought nothing could top Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Kazuchika Okada but then these 4 came along. This match absolutely ruled these 4 men couldn’t put on a bad match if they tried. It was amazing to see Okada and Omega, who had my current MOTY, in the ring again together but that wasn’t all that made this special, Kota Ibushi and Tomohiro Ishii towards the end had an amazing sequence of moves that just battered the hell out of each other. This match was 100 MPH towards the end with one of my favorite closing sequences of the year and these 4 put on one of my favorite tag matches of all time in terms of in-ring work. 

Feud of the Month: Marty Scurrl vs. Kazuchika Okada, the story here was simple, nobody thought Scurrl could beat Okada and Scurrl tried to improve himself to get on the level of Okada creating a multi-layered really fun storyline. Marty Scurrl delivered a great performance in the storyline but also the match and Kazuchika Okada played the perfect legend that Scurrl had to take down. One of my favorite near falls came from this match, when the referee was down Scurrl hit Okada with the umbrella and a rainmaker finisher and got really close to 3. Scurrl improved his ability to tell a story by being in this feud and it really stood out in a busy wrestling month. 

The team of the Month: So Cal Uncensored, while I could’ve given this to the Golden Lovers and had Kenny Omega get even more points I decided that SCU had a better performance this month. These guys have been a great comedy act for a while now and this month decided to go after the ROH tag titles. They delivered a good match at All In against the Briscoes, they delivered a great match again against the Briscoes at Death Before Dishonor, and a very solid tag match against Chase Owens and Hangman Page at NJPW FSU. These guys have shown that they are the perfect mix of comedy acts and in-ring talents this month and I’m excited to see the future for these guys. 

Most Improved: Marty Scurrl, while there wasn’t a lot of room for improvement for Scurrl as he was already one of the top tier wrestlers, he showed a new side to him this month that I loved. Scurrl is focused on joint manipulation and being a dick mostly in matches. This month, in his feud with Okada he was an underdog fighting a heavyweight and showed that he can really play any role. Not only was he a great underdog he hung with Okada in a great match and delivered a great match against Will Ospreay at NJPW FSU and a 10-Man Tag at Death Before Dishonor. 

Champions:

WWE:

• Universal: Roman Reigns 42+ Days
• Raw Women’s: Ronda Rousey 42+ Days
• IC: Seth Rollins 42+ Days
• Cruiserweight: Cedric Alexander 175+ Days
• Raw Tag: Drew Mcintyre and Dolph Ziggler 27+ Days
• WWE: AJ Styles 327+ Days
• SD Women’s: Becky Lynch 14+ Days
• US: Shinsuke Nakamura 77+ Days
• SD Tag: New Day 40+ Days
• NXT: Tomasso Ciampa 74+ Days
• NXT North American: Ricochet 43+ Days
• NXT Women’s: Kairi Sane 42+ Days
• NXT Tag: Undisputed ERA 101+ Days
• UK: Pete Dunne 498+ Days
• UK Women’s: Rhea Ripley 35+ Days
• NJPW:
• IWGP Heavyweight: Kenny Omega 115+ Days
• IWGP IC: Chris Jericho 115+ Days
• IWGP US: Cody 2+ Days
• NEVER Openweight: Tai-Chi 15+ Days
• IWGP Heavyweight Tag: Firing Squad 2+ Days
• IWGP Jr Tag: Suzuki Gun (Yoshinobu Kanemaru and Desperado) 210+ Days
• NEVER 6-man: Firing Squad (G.O.D and Ishimori) 51+ Days
• ROH:
• World: Jay Lethal 93+ Days
• TV: Jeff Cobb 3+ Days
• Tag: The Briscoes 206+ Days
• 6-Man: The Young Bucks and Cody 72+ Days
• WOH: Sumie Sakai 177+ Days
• PWG:
• World: Walter 164+ Days
• Tag: The Rascalz 164+ Days
• Progress:
• World: Walter 69+ Days
• Tag: Aussie Open 2+ Days
• Atlas: Trent Seven 2+ Days
• Women’s: Jinny 135+ Days

Over 4-Star Matches:

• Joey Janela vs. Hangman Page Street Fight All In ****1/2
• Cody Rhodes vs. Nick Aldis NWA Title All In ****1/4
• Kenny Omega vs. Pentagon Jr All In ****3/4
• Kazuchika Okada vs. Marty Scurrl All In ****3/4
• The Young Bucks and Kota Ibushi vs. Bandido, Rey Mysterio and Fenix All in ****
• Jay Lethal vs. Jonathan Gresham ROH World Title Iron Man Match ****
• Kenny Omega and Kota Ibushi vs. Tomohiro Ishii and Will Ospreay NJPW Road to Destruction ****1/2
• Kenny Omega vs. Tomohiro Ishii IWGP Heavyweight Title Destruction in Hiroshima ****3/4
• Drew Mcintyre and Dolph Ziggler vs. Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins RAW Tag Team Titles WWE Hell In a Cell ****1/2
• AJ Styles vs. Samoa Joe WWE Title Hell in a Cell ****
• Drew Gulak vs. Cedric Alexander Cruiserweight Title 205 Live ****1/2
• Ricochet vs. Pete Dunne Champ vs. Champ Match NXT TV ****1/2
• Kushida vs. Bushi IWGP JR Title Tournament NJPW Destruction in Kobe ****1/4
• Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Kazuchika Okada G1 Briefcase NJPW Destruction in Kobe *****
• Bullet Club (The Young Bucks, Marty Scurrl, Hangman Page, and Cody) vs. Chaos (Best Friends, Kazuchika Okada, Tomohiro Ishii, and Rocky Romero) ROH DBD ****
• Jay Lethal vs. Will Ospreay ROH World Title Death Before Dishonor ****3/4
• Jeff Cobb, Chris Sabin, and Flip Gordon vs Hirooki Goto and The Best Friends NJPW FSU ****
• Will Ospreay vs. Marty Scurrl IWGP Jr Title Tournament NJPW FSU ****1/2
• The Young Bucks vs. Firing Squad IWGP Heavyweight Tag Titles NJPW FSU ****1/4
• Cody vs. Juice Robinson IWGP US Title NJPW FSU ****1/4
• Kota Ibushi and Kenny Omega vs. Kazuchika Okada and Tomohiro Ishii NJPW FSU *****

Still Leader of the Race: Kenny Omega

1. Kenny Omega: 234 Points
2. Kazuchika Okada: 221 Points
3. The Young Bucks: 167 Points
4. Kota Ibushi: 155 Points
5. Will Ospreay: 140 Points
6. Zack Sabre Jr: 132 Points
7. Hiromu Takahashi: 127 Points
8. Walter: 120 Points
9. Johnny Gargano: 116 Points
10. Hiroshi Tanahashi: 112 Points
11. Undisputed ERA: 105 Points
12. Tomasso Ciampa: 102 Points
13. Tomohiro Ishii: 95 Points
14. Marty Scurrl -AJ Styles: 93 Points
15. Seth Rollins: 85 Points
16. Cody Rhodes: 73 Points
17. Adam Cole -Sanada -Hangman Page: 66 Points
18. Tyler Bate -Hirooki Goto: 65 Points
19. Trent Seven -Cedric Alexander: 60 Points
20. Alexa Bliss: 58 Points
21. Jay Lethal -Travis Banks: 57 Points
22. Pete Dunne: 56 Points
23. Jay White -Tetsuya Naito -Dalton Castle: 55 Points
24. Andrade Almas: 50 Points
25. Brock Lesnar: 49 Points
26. Zack Gibson: 48 Points
27. Juice Robinson: 47 Points
28. Flip Gordon -Minoru Suzuki -Evil -The Briscoes -Kushida: 45 Points
29. Matt Riddle: 44 Points
30. Ricochet: 43 Points
31. Shinsuke Nakamura: 42 Points
32. The Miz -Chris Jericho: 40 Points
33. Jeff Cobb: 39 Points
34. El Desperado: 38 Points
35. Aleister Black -Michael Elgin: 35 Points
36. Dolph Ziggler: 33 Points
37. Dragon Lee –So Cal Uncensored -Taiji Ishimori -Roman Reigns: 32 Points
38. Braun Strowman -Finn Balor -Becky Lynch -The Rascalz: 30 Points
39. Chuck Taylor:29 Points
40. Firing Squad -Bandido: 28 Points
41. Ronda Rousey: 26 Points
42. Jonathan Gresham -Charlotte: 25 Points
43. Matt Taven -Yoshinobu Kanemaru: 23 Points
44. Chris Sabin -Keith Lee: 22 Points
45. Joey Janela -Roppongi 3k -Killian Dain -Kalisto -Ember Moon -Jeff Hardy -Velveteen Dream -Mustafa Ali -Buddy Murphy -The Bar -Sumie Sakai -Kairi Sane -David Starr -Doug Williams: 20 Points
46. Jinny: 19 Points
47. James Drake: 18 Points
48. Danny Burch and Oney Lorcan -Bludgeon Brothers -Shayna Baszler -Punishment Martinez: 17 Points
49. New Day: 16 Points
50. Drew Gulak -Trent Baretta -Asuka -Usos -John Cena -Silas Young -Bobby Roode -EC3 -Kevin Owens -Timothy Thatcher: 15 Points
51. Nia Jax -The Kingdom: 13 Points
52. Toni Storm -Drew Mcintyre: 12 Points
53. Samoa Joe -Pentagon Jr -Rey Fenix -Sanity -Kenny King -Dave Finlay -Lars Sullivan -Bray Wyatt -ACH -Jack Gallagher -Sasha Banks -Yoshi-Hashi -Rusev -Jonah Rock -Rey Horus -Aussie Open -Kassius Ohno -Jimmy Havoc: 10 Points
54. Nick Aldis -Rey Mysterio -Dean Ambrose -Hideo Itami -Chase Owens -Beer City Bruiser -Shane Taylor -Togi Makabe -Sami Zayn -Baron Corbin -TJP -Akira Tozawa -Kurt Angle -HHH -Rysuke Taguchi -Naomi -Elias -Daniel Bryan -Rhea Ripley -Adam Brooks -Brody King -Mark Haskins -Chris Brookes -Jordan Devlin