Bonjour! This is week 3 of my new hopefully long term series Wrestlers of the Week, Where I will be very bias every week and use these biases to decide who the best wrestler of 15 years ago were!
The Rules are simple
– The evaluation period start and ends on Monday every week (in 2007)
– The higher you rank the more points you get
– You must have won a match this week to be considered for the list.
–Tag teams are typically bunched together unless one is significantly more notable than the other
– The time period is 15 years ago to the day.
People who show up on this list spread across 6 different shows with only one of them being on multiple and they will be ranked on my personal enjoyment of the match (70%) and the significance of their victories (30%).
Honorable mentions!
The Great Khali’s chair (Smackdown) (Follow up article coming)
The Prophet (F1rst Wrestling)
Just a reminder our current top 10 is
1) Kurt Angle & Yuji Nagata 10
3) CIMA, Daisuke Sekimoto, Katsumasa Inoue & Mammoth Sasaki 9
7) Shingo Takagi, Brother Devon & Brother Ray 8
10) Chavo Guerrero, Takashi Sasaki & Yuko Miyamoto 7
Now let’s get on to the list!
10) Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio (NOAH)
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio earned a spot on this list by successfully defending their tag team titles against Kentaro Shiga & Kishin Kawabata in a near 30 minute match. This wasn’t the best match of the night not even close tbh but it was enough to get the job done and earn 1 point for each
Total Points: 1
9) Christopher Daniels (TNA)
Christopher Daniels has earned this spot by winning the TNA Ultimate X gauntlet match and reforming Triple X in the process at the TNA Victory Road 2007 PPV. This match was by far the best match of a weak ppv and now Daniels gets a future shot at the X-Division title.
Total Points: 2
8) Mitsuharu Misawa (NOAH)
Mitsuharu Misawa earned a spot n this list by having an just about average GHC title against Akira Taue in a match that was pretty hard to watch in hindsight and not that fun in execution. But the achievement of getting a world title defense in earns Misawa a nice 3 points
Total Points: 3
7) Abyss (TNA)
Abyss earned a spot on this weeks list by having a very fun match with Lance Hoyt on Impact and also getting the victory on PPV over AJ Styles & Tomko while teaming with Sting in what was a boring but passable match. 2 wins equals 4 points this week for Abyss
Total Points: 4
6) Johnny Nitro (ECW)
Johnny Nitro earned a spot on this list by having a great Extreme Rules match in the main event of ECW against Tommy Dreamer which was like a love letter to the Tommy Dreamer/Raven feud with Nitro winning with Raven spots.
Total points: 5
5) Brandon Thomaselli (CZW)
Brandon Thomaselli earned a spot on this list by having my favorite singles match of the week against his brother Vito Thomaselli in the first round of the CZW Best of the Best tournament. While he did go on to be eliminated later that night this one win plus a great performance in the 4 way are enough to earn 6 points this week.
Total Points: 6
4) B-Boy (CZW)
B-Boy earned a spot on this weeks list by making it to the finals of the CZW best of the best tournament where he sadly got injured in the finals and didn’t get to put his 100% in the finals. But the achievement of making it that far + victories over Cheech, Brandon Thomaselli, Jigsaw and Ricochet in enough for 7 points
Total Points: 7
3) Billy Ken Kid & Tigers Mask (Osaka Pro)
Billy Ken Kid & Tigers Mask earned their spot on this weeks list by winning the finals of the 2007 Osaka Pro Tag festival in a 30 minute match against Black Buffalo & GAINA. This was the first time I’m really watching any Osaka Pro but I was highly impressed by the 4 in this match.
Total Points: 8
2) Joker (CZW)
Joker earned a spot on this list by winning the CZW Best of the Best finals over B-Boy who like I said earlier was sadly injured in the finals so it was a pretty easy win for Joker. But along side that Joker had an amazing match with Drake Younger and had victories over Human Tornado, Ricky Reyes & Scotty Vortekz. One might be wonder how Joker celebrated his tournament win and all I can say for sure is that it wasn’t at a gay bar.
Total Points: 9
1) KENTA & Taiji Ishimori (NOAH)
KENTA & Taiji Ishimori earned the number 1 spot on this list by not only winning the 2007 Nippon TV Cup Junior Heavyweight Tag League tournament over some amazingly solid teams, they also had the best match of the week when they defeated Kota Ibushi & Naomichi Marufuji in a 5* match if I’ve ever seen one. So much amazing junior action that was boosted by Taiji Ishimori hitting a beautiful handspring double moonsault elbow drop to get the victory and also earn 10 points on this weeks wrestlers of the week
Total Points: 10
