Big Bad Blog Video Theater-Riho vs Hikaru Shida

Here's the match video of Riho vs Hikaru Shida from Saturday's AEW show. Earlier in the show, they did a battle royal and the winner of that battle royal will face the winner of this match for the AEW Women's Championship on their first TNT show. The battle royal winner was Nyla Rose who will remind you of Nia Jax or Impact Wrestling's Jordynne Grace. Wrestling promoters are such copycats. Apparently Riho pinned Nyla in a recent multi person match. When commentary immediately made a big deal about that, I knew Riho was going over. I guess AEW looks at the size difference as intriguing. But it's a dead end because Riho announced a few weeks ago that she is remaining in Japan and will freelance. Hikaru signed a three year contract and she is moving to the US after her final Japanese match on Oct. 15. Commentary mentions that but nothing about Riho. She has two dates left after Saturday. The big problem with this match is the commentary. They need to find someone who knows joshi. Kenny Omega is knowledgeable but as beloved as Jim Ross is, not only does he not know joshi but he doesn't come across well. And the other guys are clearly reading from notes given to them. If the AEW is going to showcase joshi the way Tony Khan says he wants to, he needs to find announcers who are knowledgeable. Right now the commentary is half assed. The match is fine. I have seen both women do better. But I would have liked to see Hikaru go full blown heel and beat the crap out of Riho before losing. You saw how Io Shirai got over as a heel. Hikaru can do that. AEW is also having Britt Baker feud with Bea Priestly. Why isn't that the first title match? That's an easy hot build. Of course later on they may wish they had done that. Enjoy the video!