Bear with me for a bit of a digression to start here, folks.
Indie legend Chris Hero (currently known as NXT’s Kassius Ohno) has a six-point match rating scale. It’s not terribly dissimilar from Dave Meltzer’s star rating scale, really, a gradient from bad to great divided into discrete, easily understood chunks, and, occasionally, on exceptional merits, the scale gets broken wide open.
Let’s look at Mr. Hero’s scale and see what he puts as his high rating...
- Bad
- Okay
- Bad with some good parts
- Good
- Great
- TOZAWA
Neville Level, indeed.
AH!
So, Akira Tozawa has the respect of his peers, to be certain. But things that happened outside WWE only matter so much once you’re in the system, so let’s take a look at what he’s done since arriving in WWE.
He made it to the quarter finals of the Cruiserweight Classic, falling to Gran Metalik after beating Kenneth Johnson and Jack Gallagher in the first two rounds, spent a short few months in NXT, mostly off TV, before getting brought to 205 Live, where his success has only grown. He defeated former Cruiserweight Champion Brian Kendrick decisively in a months-long feud centered around the veteran trying to essentially give him wrestling lessons, culminating in a brutal street fight.
That got him a look from Titus O’Neil, fresh off signing fellow Dragon Gate alumnus Apollo Crews to the Titus Brand (now Titus Worldwide) and looking to expand his reach to 205 Live. Tozawa was understandably skeptical but soon accepted the offer, which immediately paid off as Titus’ navigated his way to a title shot for his client.
AH!
Of course, Neville isn’t to be ignored in this equation himself. The self-proclaimed King of the Cruiserweights has held the title in a death grip since winning it from Rich Swann in January, fending off the likes of Jack Gallagher, Austin Aries, and TJP to prove his dominance. That would seem to edge out Tozawa’s resume, but there’s one critical fact of their histories I’ve yet to mention.
These two men from opposite sides of the globe were forged in the same crucible, honing their edge in Dragon Gate with the same fast-paced, hard-hitting, high flying style.
Indeed, they’ve met three times in singles action before, once for the mothership in 2008, and twice in Dragon Gate USA, in 2011 and 2012. There, the relatively more experienced Neville prevailed in their first two matches, but the third encounter, at Dragon Gate USA Open the Golden Gate, ended in a victory for Tozawa.
Has the curve of experience leveled in favor of the Power of Tozawa, or will he just be another superstar who wasn’t on the Neville Level?