In What A Maneuver, 3MBooth looks at moves that make us say What A Maneuver!

Global Force Wrestling, Jeff Jarrett’s new wrestling promotion made it possible for fans outside of Japan to watch New Japan Pro Wrestling’s Wrestle Kingdom 9. Jim Ross and Matt Striker called the action for us gaijin as we watched on PPV, either live on Sunday morning at 2am or via replay at 7pm later that day. We had a 3ManBooth slumber party, watching Japan’s finest do battle. If you haven’t seen it, you should; it’s some of the best wrestling we’ve seen, a great mixture of styles as well. There were high flyers, brawlers, MMA fighters and traditional style matches. One style and fighter that stood out is the King of Strong Style, Shinsuke Nakamura.

We saw a glimpse of what he could do at the ROH / NJPW War of the Worlds show when he fought Kevin Steen. This time Nakamura was defending his Intercontinental title against Kota Ibushi. Frankly, they beat the hell out of each other using kicks, knees, slaps, forearms and fists. But when Ibushi went for this suplex…

grabbing Nakamura from the ring apron, tossing him into the middle if the ring, onto his head…

WE LOST IT! Sitting there, covering our mouths trying not to wake our neighbors (it was 5 in the morning), we knew we were watching the match of the night. Nakamura ultimately recovered and prevailed but Ibushi definitely emerged from that match a star with a maneuver like that!