Wrestling Viewing Guide: June 3 - 9, 2018

There’s a ton of wrestling content nowadays and unless you’re a hardcore pro-graps fan, you have to decide what to watch when and what to consider leaving out. That’s where we come in to help.

Every week, we are going to run down the big in-ring happenings for the easily accessible US wrestling. This won’t cover your indie needs, but ReverendClaire always has you covered in her weekly Sermon on the Mat for that.

Bear in mind, matches could be added after this posts that would definitely change how worth a show is to watch.

Monday

Best of the Super Juniors Finals (New Japan World)

NJPW’s tournament showcasing their junior heavyweights ends here.

By the time this publishes, you’ll know what the finals are. However, at the time of writing this, it’s still up in the air to some degree. (The second to last night of BOSJ will happen very early Sunday morning.)

This winner of the tournament will face Will Ospreay for the Junior Heavyweight title at Dominion. My guess is Ishimori, who looks like he’ll be the winner of his block, will be the man to win it all.

Verdict: This will surely be a good match so worth checking out if you’re a fan. Personally, I don’t have ton of time for all the promotions, and I’m definitely watching Dominion, which also airs this week, so I may not end up watching this.

Raw (USA Network)

Only two weeks until Money in the Bank. This week, we get a couple matches involving those who are in the men’s ladder match.

Bobby Roode will fight Braun Strowman (good luck there Bobby) and Finn Balor will face Kevin Owens.

Nia Jax, who looks to be playing heel against Ronda Rousey in their title feud, will face Natalya. Nattie has been cast in the role of “Ronda’s friend.”

Verdict: There’s not much of note making this any “must watch.” However, WWE has had some entertaining shows on both Monday and Tuesday as they build to Money in the Bank. Often, they get lazy building to multiple multi-person matches, but this time, they’ve done enough to hold my interest.

Tuesday

SmackDown Live (USA Network)

Advertised this week is Becky Lynch vs. Charlotte. This is just a match between friends to try to get a little momentum heading into Money in the Bank. Obviously both women want to win the briefcase. Becky feels she’s been on the sidelines too long while Charlotte wants a route back to that title she just lost.

Also, Lana will team with Aiden English to face Jimmy Uso and Naomi. We haven’t seen any hint of Lana trying to break up Rusev Day since that initial time. Is that something on hold? Or will we see that advanced at all this week?

Meanwhile, AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura are heading towards their Last Man Standing title match at Money in the Bank. They’ll have a contract signing this week.

Verdict: SmackDown has been very solid as of late, but this episode doesn’t have the advertised hook the last couple weeks had.

205 Live (WWE Network)

Last week, Cedric Alexander successfully defended his cruiserweight title against Buddy Murphy. So who’s next to face Ced? Maybe we’ll learn something about that this week.

Verdict: There’s nothing advertised for this week. The show has good in ring action, but hasn’t been hooking me much lately.

Wednesday

NXT (WWE Network)

Advertised for this week:

• Kairi Sane vs. Lacey Evens
• Danny Burch vs. Roderick Strong

A promo two weeks ago had me thinking Strong vs. Burch was last week, and I mentioned that in here. I apologize to anyone who tuned in looking for that.

Sane vs. Evans is the rubbermatch as both women have taken a win in their last two matches.

Also, Velveteen Dream has a feud brewing with Ricochet, and it is a hot one. And last week, Nikki Cross stole the Women’s title from Shayna Baszler. Cross is the perfect foil for Baszler since Shayna cannot play mind games with Nikki.

Verdict: NXT has been consistently good as of late and has some really good programs going.

Thursday

Impact Wrestling (Pop TV)

This is the fallout from Under Pressure, where both Su Yung and Austin Aries won singles titles.

The big match this week is a chapter in the Eddie Edwards/Sami Callihan feud. And they’re going to fight this week... in the woods.

I have no idea how that’s going to go. But they story has been great so I’m going to give them a chance on this one.

Verdict: The woods match is a curious enough one, but that story has been good. It’ll be interesting to see the fallout from the matches from Under Pressure.

Saturday

NJPW Dominion (New Japan World)

This is going to be a good one.

Kenny Omega and Kazuchika Okada are having a 2 out of 3 falls match for the IWGP heavyweight title. Will Kenny finally win that title?

Chris Jericho will challenge Tetsuya Naito for the Intercontinental title. And I think there’s a possibility he wins it.

Those two matches alone are worth watching. And Rey Mysterio Jr. will be there.

See the entire card here.

Verdict: This is a must watch right here if you’re at all interested in this promotion. The Chris Jericho factor always makes things interesting.

---

If I could only watch one thing this week, it’d be:

Dominion

Easy pick this week. This card looks stacked and I may be more interested in this than I was in Wrestle Kingdom (and I was very interested in Wrestle Kingdom). I legit think Jericho can win their IC belt. And Kenny/Okada always delivers.

I work that morning so I’m going internet dark until I can watch the show to remain spoiler free.

Let us know what you’d choose below.

---

There’s a ton of other wrestling out there and we can’t cover it all on here. So if there’s something you’re particularly excited for this week, let your fellow wrestling fans know in the comments.

See ya next week!