Tonight saw the next set of Detonation tapings from Hollywood, California.
Bateman of Stray Dog Army appeared at the top of the show with Ian Riccaboni & Alex Koslov. He talked about his match on the show against newcomer Jakob Austin Young. Bateman mentioned that the two had wrestled long ago, and that tonight he'd be checking to see how much "love" is in Austin's violence these days.
Bateman defeated Jakob Austin Young
Bateman bullied Young for a long while until Austin connected with a leg lariat after a few minutes. The crowd then got behind Bateman, the heel, chanting "Let's go Bateman" when Austin would get in any offense. Young hit a back suplex for a count of two. In the end, Bateman put Young away with a tombstone piledriver for the win.
KENTA defeated Bad Dude Tito
This was good. KENTA got a great reaction on his way to the ring. Early on, Tito bullied KENTA, knocking him off his feet with shoulder blocks and shouting things like "You're too small!!" and "Too much power!!"
Throughout the match, KENTA targeted Tito's knees and worked them over for a good while. Later, he smashed Tito with big kicks to his chest. Tito would return with a short kick to KENTA's breadbasket followed by a nice spinning enzuigiri to the back of the head. KENTA would take Tito off his feet again with a dragon screw leg whip, then blast him with a big basement dropkick in the corner, Shibata-style.
When KENTA went for the GTS, Tito reversed it into a Blue Thunder for two. The finish saw KENTA grab the ref while Tito held him in a fireman's carry. He used this moment to slip out of Tito's clutch, and then, behind the ref's back, kicked Tito in the groin then cradled him for the hollow victory. I'd love to see another one between these two next year.
Emily Mae interviewed STRONG Openweight Champion Fred Rosser and talked about his upcoming title defense against JR Kratos, who didn't reveal his full gameplan, though he did mention that he was planning to run Kratos' gas tank down to empty. They'll face off in the main event on next week's episode.
STRONG Openweight Tag Team Championship: Motor City Machine Guns (Chris Sabin & Alex Shelley) (c) defeated Stray Dog Army (Barrett Brown & Misterioso)
Motor City Machine Guns, the second tag team champions, took on Stray Dog Army, who recently won their number-one contender match to earn their title shot this week.
After about five minutes, the Stray Dog Army took control. Brown finally tagged out to Misterioso, who quickly dove onto Sabin on the floor then hit a slingshot double-knee drop onto Shelley in the ring. Later, Stray Dog Army double-teamed Shelley, with Brown connecting with a basement dropkick before Misterioso used a quebrada in the ring for two.
When Misterioso went for a second-rope moonsault, Shelley got his knees up and Misterioso crashed into them. Shelley tagged Sabin in and Misterioso tagged Brown. Sabin caught Brown with a huge tornado DDT for two. They did an assisted flatliner to Brown for another close nearfall.
Brown did a dive onto MCMG onto the floor and Misterioso followed up with a big Asai moonsault. He followed up back in the ring with a guillotine legdrop onto Sabin for two.
In the end, MCMG put Brown away with the Dirty Bomb in 12:11 to pick up the win and successfully retain their tag titles.
Final thoughts:
This was a short but solid episode of Strong, with KENTA and Bad Dude Tito and the main event tag match being the highlights of the show this week.
The next set of matches from Detonation will air next week and features Fred Rosser defending his STRONG Openweight championship against Team Filthy's JR Kratos.
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