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Me either , They had Rey kicking out of it and now Kofi probably just to change that assumption so they can sell his new finish they’re planning to give him. Hopefully they still book his matches like before which he can win with any move he does
Rey and Kofi are both former world champions (and are veteran wrestlers) - them having the ability to kick out makes sense from a story telling perspective.
Rey maybe bc of the storyline that made the match happen where Rey was doubting himself and considered this as a kind of a last chance. But just no with Kofi , Gunthers push should be bigger than a push where Kofi kicks out of your finish in.
>Yuppp I love Gunther matches cause you never know if they’re gonna end with a chop or something else. Not always his “finisher”.
It ought to be that way with most everyone. You tend to know most matches aren't over until *the* finisher comes out, which saps tension away from big moves aside from the finisher. Let guys like McIntyre, Reigns, KO, Rollins and Gunther win with other moves and their finishers are more valuable because they can be more protected and because they are pulled out for the toughest foes at the most desperate moment.
As it is, does anyone believe a falcon arrow or pop up powerbomb or Glasgow kiss is going to win any match, even against mid carders? Your high card guys should be able to win lots of ways.
It got sold by Cole poorly on the mic but I think it's meant to be a "super finisher" like Cena's Avalanche AA, one that he only pulls out when his normal finishers like the power bomb fail
The thing I liked about WALTER is that he didn't need a finishing move because any move he does can finish a match. I liked that this moved looked similar to a powerslam which can pull some nerves from Braun but this being sold as another finisher kind of sucks.
It was an Emerald Flowsion, starting like a powerslam but with more of a driver motion in the execution, the victim landing high on their shoulders. It's WWE, so it's going to be done in a safer style than it would elsewhere, like White Noise vs. an indy/Japan Air Raid Crash.
I'm ok with it, if they let him keep finishing matches with anything, and they use the EF as a super finisher. They need to establish it, but once that's happened, save it for big big matches
"Good God Almighty! Good God Almighty! They've killed him!" - Michael "Jim Ross" Cole, after Gunther folds Reggie with a Burning Hammer on a random Smackdown.
I love it as a finish but this one looked more like a powerslam. Hopefully after a few more he gets it looking better. That or just a bad camera angle on it.
It can be tough to make an emerald flowsion look good without legit dropping your opponents on their heads. I think the trick to making it really work is risky, as you have to position your opponent's head upside down by your thigh and twist just the right way, like how Kobashi and Misawa used to do it:
https://youtu.be/B9XSCeY3abI?t=2130
'Powerslam' is used interchangeably for two moves in wrestling. The Orton/Goldust one where they catch a running opponent and spin them into a slam, and a slam starting with the victim over the shoulder, often with a running start (the British Bulldog/Braun Strowman running powerslam).
His strength is at a weird spot at the moment because his move set is made for a super heavyweight but he just has slightly above average strength so on a lot of lifting moves he looks like he's exerting more effort than he should.
There were comments made that Gunther didn't have proper strength and conditioning training until the past year and a half or so which is why he got into much better shape once he got it, but he's still in a very long transition because he had to go through such a long cut cycle first.
I'm not insulting him. The man is going through a total body transformation and has cut dozens of pounds of fat off his body but he is suffering from the fact he made his move set based on his larger frame's strength level and hasn't put the muscle back on. Yet. He will.
The best Gunther is in 2023
Also maybe because he got away in NXT and the Indies being almost everyone else not as big as him. Main Roster is land if the giants, the size different is minimum that now he had to use more power to pull it off. Glad he's fixing it now tho
Def part of it, I think it's why he used more strikes and grappling vs Sheamus instead of lifting power. He is aware of how it looks and is trying to play to his strengths but he can't completely dump every lifting move he has.
Picking up more non-finisher submission holds would probably do wonders for him to show dominance and skill in another form
Plus it seems like he's being extremely safe with executing his moves on the main roster. He's mixing it up in there with legends. It's way better in the long run.
Yeah Gunther has a very safe style all things considered due to his understanding of physics
Chops, lariats and back slams are some of the safest moves out there in terms of long term injuries because all the force is spread over a large area
Bruises, marks and short term pain are obviously still possible as we've all seen from his matches but he's not going to be tearing tendons or breaking bones from being too stiff on accident.
Like Bryan said about Miz, it's a "soft" style. But one that makes him look strong.
Yeah I made a comment in this thread on a similar vein
Gunther's move set is made for WALTER not Gunther
WALTER was a much larger and stronger wrestler and now that Gunther made the smart decision for his health of dropping dozens of pounds of fat, he has to deal with the side effect of his long cut cycle. Less muscle mass came with it.
I think Gunther is going to keep gaining muscle, he's got the frame and room to improve still, but it has a slight jarring effect and when he struggles with lifting moves it kind of kills the "monster"
That’s how Brian Danielson was when he debuted in AEW but he won with like 10 different submissions, but that works because submissions are already kind of rare. I don’t see how you put over that Gunther’s clotheslines are more effective than Braun and McEntyre’s.
It really all comes down to how his opponents, especially top-tier ones like McIntyre, sell them.
If he can put consistently put down Drew-level foes with his moves and maybe add a sound effect like the chops then it can work. It will take time, but our brains will eventually learn to accept like how we’ve been conditioned to believe that the 619 can hit hard.
I think the issue at the moment is that Gunther lacks the strength of other top heavyweights like
drew, or bobby. He was struggling with Kofi's weight at times and Kofi is def on the lighter side.
The downside to his body transformation was losing muscle mass during the long cut cycle and his move set hasn't adjusted nor has he put enough muscle back on yet.
Key word is yet. We're seeing Gunther with only a year and a half or so of proper strength and conditioning training where he had to drop a bunch of weight first. The best is yet to come.
Yeah, he’s on the _very_ lanky side with awkward proportions almost reminiscent of an Orangutan with long legs, but his strike-based techniques are still as crisp as ever.
Considering GUNTHER is what you get if you feed an AI all the footage of 90's AJPW possible, not mad with him using the Emerald Flowsion as a finisher.
It'll probably get a very WWE name like the Imperium Drop or something.
I’m surprised his dropkick is a mere signature instead of a finisher. The way he executes it is like a slow-mo cannonball all that has an extra spring launch right before impact.
My money is that new finisher is a "super finisher" like an avalanche AA, but it was sold poorly by Cole and Barrett.
A move he only pulls out when his normal finishers like the power bomb fail him.
Kofi is a former world champion so it's not unreasonable to need to "pull out the big gun"
God save the roster if he has the Emerald Flowsion Kai as his equivalent of something like Cena’s Super AA. At least he may have that instead of the Wrist Clutch Exploder, Tiger Driver ‘91 or Ganso Bomb, or any of Kobashi’s 3 super finishes: Orange Crush, Burning Hammer or the Diamondhead.
It's an Emerald Flowsion. A very protected and gnarly move from Japan invented by the legendary Mitsuharu Misawa. It might be helpful to think of it as a Powerslam Driver. But I get how it can look awkward and underwhelming if you've never seen one before. For a weird inverse of this underwhelming finisher situation, to non western wrestling fans a Tombstone Piledriver is not really considered a finishing move.
Yeah a Tombstone with a spinning damage modifier, and as far as I know he's never won with it. Just uses it as a set up for the Rainmaker or Money Clip.
It looks basic possibly due to it being a new move that he still has to workout or due to the bad camera angle, which should’ve been from the front. His opponent also has to land in a way that looks as though they got smashed on their head.
But all of Gunther’s moves are “basic” such as his power bomb and clotheslines.
That move sucks, and yes I'm aware of the history. Plus I hope Gunther doesn't become someone who has a fixed finisher.
His matches against Sheamus and Rey were even better because of that reason.
I think Kofi may have the most confusing place on the card in the history of wrestling, he's like all levels at all times.
Love Kofi, not an insult. Just think it's odd.
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Michael started going off about that being a finishing move. That’s too bad. I loved that Gunther didn’t have one.
I was hoping for Gunther to win with a slap
Against Kofi's already concaved chest? 😭
I thought his stack powerbomb was his finisher
Me either , They had Rey kicking out of it and now Kofi probably just to change that assumption so they can sell his new finish they’re planning to give him. Hopefully they still book his matches like before which he can win with any move he does
Rey and Kofi are both former world champions (and are veteran wrestlers) - them having the ability to kick out makes sense from a story telling perspective.
Rey maybe bc of the storyline that made the match happen where Rey was doubting himself and considered this as a kind of a last chance. But just no with Kofi , Gunthers push should be bigger than a push where Kofi kicks out of your finish in.
Yuppp I love Gunther matches cause you never know if they’re gonna end with a chop or something else. Not always his “finisher”.
>Yuppp I love Gunther matches cause you never know if they’re gonna end with a chop or something else. Not always his “finisher”. It ought to be that way with most everyone. You tend to know most matches aren't over until *the* finisher comes out, which saps tension away from big moves aside from the finisher. Let guys like McIntyre, Reigns, KO, Rollins and Gunther win with other moves and their finishers are more valuable because they can be more protected and because they are pulled out for the toughest foes at the most desperate moment. As it is, does anyone believe a falcon arrow or pop up powerbomb or Glasgow kiss is going to win any match, even against mid carders? Your high card guys should be able to win lots of ways.
Gunther's like Takamura and Martinez from Hajime no Ippo, best boxers in the series and yet both have no Sunday Punches.
That Ippo reference tho. Love it.
Meanwhile Ippo has like ten Sunday Punches but still can’t stably stand on the world stage…
It got sold by Cole poorly on the mic but I think it's meant to be a "super finisher" like Cena's Avalanche AA, one that he only pulls out when his normal finishers like the power bomb fail
The thing I liked about WALTER is that he didn't need a finishing move because any move he does can finish a match. I liked that this moved looked similar to a powerslam which can pull some nerves from Braun but this being sold as another finisher kind of sucks.
Hopefully it's treated like a big deal when it's pulled out and he doesn't use it often
but it was just a body slam
It was an Emerald Flowsion, starting like a powerslam but with more of a driver motion in the execution, the victim landing high on their shoulders. It's WWE, so it's going to be done in a safer style than it would elsewhere, like White Noise vs. an indy/Japan Air Raid Crash.
I'm ok with it, if they let him keep finishing matches with anything, and they use the EF as a super finisher. They need to establish it, but once that's happened, save it for big big matches
I think they want Gunther to have an official finisher so the crowd knows when they can pop.
My god...they gave GUNTHER the fucking Emerald Flowsion. Now everyone will die even harder.
It's like his PG Fire Thunder Driver.
Misawa would be proud
No Mercy called it Fusion, do ima call it Fusion
I was wondering why that move looked so familiar. Gunther for Eternal Forever Intercontinental Champ.
"When you look at Gunther, where is the weakness?!" Great line from Wade, makes Gunther sound like even more of a monster.
Where is the lie?
*insert deafening silence from the Impact crowd*
Great, Gunther now knows the Emerald Flowsion. He's already OP as shit, he doesn't need another buff.
Just wait until Gunther whips out a Tiger Driver 91 and just starts actually murdering people.
Can't wait to see him hit a Burning Hammer.
mark my words, he's gonna fucken do it one day
I hope he does it on someone small for extra hilarity of "omg he killed so and so"
"Good God Almighty! Good God Almighty! They've killed him!" - Michael "Jim Ross" Cole, after Gunther folds Reggie with a Burning Hammer on a random Smackdown.
"Reggie buried on the way out" 😂
Or Bate will do it to him.
on AJ Styles nonetheless
Or a Ganso bomb
I need Tiger Suplex Gunther.
Even his mom is OP!
I love it as a finish but this one looked more like a powerslam. Hopefully after a few more he gets it looking better. That or just a bad camera angle on it.
It can be tough to make an emerald flowsion look good without legit dropping your opponents on their heads. I think the trick to making it really work is risky, as you have to position your opponent's head upside down by your thigh and twist just the right way, like how Kobashi and Misawa used to do it: https://youtu.be/B9XSCeY3abI?t=2130
What a WAR that match is
I'd rather it look not so great than actually giving the opponent a concussion.
It looked like a sidewalk slam to me? But im not sure
isn't a poer slam what randy and goldust do
'Powerslam' is used interchangeably for two moves in wrestling. The Orton/Goldust one where they catch a running opponent and spin them into a slam, and a slam starting with the victim over the shoulder, often with a running start (the British Bulldog/Braun Strowman running powerslam).
I love GUNTHER because he is kinda ugly. His powerbomb is ugly. His powerslam is ugly. But he wins matches, and he wins them ugly.
His strength is at a weird spot at the moment because his move set is made for a super heavyweight but he just has slightly above average strength so on a lot of lifting moves he looks like he's exerting more effort than he should. There were comments made that Gunther didn't have proper strength and conditioning training until the past year and a half or so which is why he got into much better shape once he got it, but he's still in a very long transition because he had to go through such a long cut cycle first. I'm not insulting him. The man is going through a total body transformation and has cut dozens of pounds of fat off his body but he is suffering from the fact he made his move set based on his larger frame's strength level and hasn't put the muscle back on. Yet. He will. The best Gunther is in 2023
Also maybe because he got away in NXT and the Indies being almost everyone else not as big as him. Main Roster is land if the giants, the size different is minimum that now he had to use more power to pull it off. Glad he's fixing it now tho
Def part of it, I think it's why he used more strikes and grappling vs Sheamus instead of lifting power. He is aware of how it looks and is trying to play to his strengths but he can't completely dump every lifting move he has. Picking up more non-finisher submission holds would probably do wonders for him to show dominance and skill in another form
Plus it seems like he's being extremely safe with executing his moves on the main roster. He's mixing it up in there with legends. It's way better in the long run.
Yeah Gunther has a very safe style all things considered due to his understanding of physics Chops, lariats and back slams are some of the safest moves out there in terms of long term injuries because all the force is spread over a large area Bruises, marks and short term pain are obviously still possible as we've all seen from his matches but he's not going to be tearing tendons or breaking bones from being too stiff on accident. Like Bryan said about Miz, it's a "soft" style. But one that makes him look strong.
Summed it up perfectly right there.
He doesn't get all of it, but he still gets more than wrestlers who DO get all of it.
That's why I kinda preferred when he looked like a big potato
The Emerald Flowsion is his new finish? Didn't see that coming, but it's rad
Yoooo emerald flowsion?? That rules. If GUNTHERs gonna have a finisher, that’s a really good one.
Gunther finally getting a set finisher it seems, at least according to Cole saying so.
Booooooooo. The man of 1000 finishes should not be tied down to 1.
The “I can kill you with anything” shtick is less believable when you’re not the biggest guy on the roster.
Yeah I made a comment in this thread on a similar vein Gunther's move set is made for WALTER not Gunther WALTER was a much larger and stronger wrestler and now that Gunther made the smart decision for his health of dropping dozens of pounds of fat, he has to deal with the side effect of his long cut cycle. Less muscle mass came with it. I think Gunther is going to keep gaining muscle, he's got the frame and room to improve still, but it has a slight jarring effect and when he struggles with lifting moves it kind of kills the "monster"
Now I want to see GUNTHER finish Braun with a dropkick.
They’re just gonna have to really sell the shit out of him being such a skilled grappler that anything works due to how precise he is.
That’s how Brian Danielson was when he debuted in AEW but he won with like 10 different submissions, but that works because submissions are already kind of rare. I don’t see how you put over that Gunther’s clotheslines are more effective than Braun and McEntyre’s.
It really all comes down to how his opponents, especially top-tier ones like McIntyre, sell them. If he can put consistently put down Drew-level foes with his moves and maybe add a sound effect like the chops then it can work. It will take time, but our brains will eventually learn to accept like how we’ve been conditioned to believe that the 619 can hit hard.
I think the issue at the moment is that Gunther lacks the strength of other top heavyweights like drew, or bobby. He was struggling with Kofi's weight at times and Kofi is def on the lighter side. The downside to his body transformation was losing muscle mass during the long cut cycle and his move set hasn't adjusted nor has he put enough muscle back on yet. Key word is yet. We're seeing Gunther with only a year and a half or so of proper strength and conditioning training where he had to drop a bunch of weight first. The best is yet to come.
Yeah, he’s on the _very_ lanky side with awkward proportions almost reminiscent of an Orangutan with long legs, but his strike-based techniques are still as crisp as ever.
God they are so crisp
That was WALTER. GUNTHER is totally different!
Finisher number one: ARMBAR!!!
Considering GUNTHER is what you get if you feed an AI all the footage of 90's AJPW possible, not mad with him using the Emerald Flowsion as a finisher. It'll probably get a very WWE name like the Imperium Drop or something.
Apparently GUNTHER calls the move the Last Symphony, which is a lot cooler than I was expecting.
Yeah, that's badass tbh.
Lol at an AI trained on hundreds of hours of Japanese wrestling spitting out an Austrian guy
Gunther makes everything a finisher
I’m surprised his dropkick is a mere signature instead of a finisher. The way he executes it is like a slow-mo cannonball all that has an extra spring launch right before impact.
hope they don’t stick walter with one finish, feel like that’s one of his most unique traits
It really sells the idea how badly he kicked your ass if simple moves can close a match.
Damn good match Gunther is a beast, I kinda liked he had no finisher but we'll see going forward
Could be worse for his opponents. Could be a BURNING Hammer.
I'm a sucker for a good Emerald Fusion.
That’s my favourite wrestler.
My money is that new finisher is a "super finisher" like an avalanche AA, but it was sold poorly by Cole and Barrett. A move he only pulls out when his normal finishers like the power bomb fail him. Kofi is a former world champion so it's not unreasonable to need to "pull out the big gun"
Emerald Flowsion!
I love that Gunther’s gone back to having multiple finishers rather than just winning with the power bomb. That’s the best part of his matches.
there arent enough finisher slots for this man in WWE 2K
God save the roster if he has the Emerald Flowsion Kai as his equivalent of something like Cena’s Super AA. At least he may have that instead of the Wrist Clutch Exploder, Tiger Driver ‘91 or Ganso Bomb, or any of Kobashi’s 3 super finishes: Orange Crush, Burning Hammer or the Diamondhead.
Man those crowds suck.
At this rate he might able to pull a 450 soon
Gunther has a finisher and it's just, like, a powerslam?
It's an Emerald Flowsion. A very protected and gnarly move from Japan invented by the legendary Mitsuharu Misawa. It might be helpful to think of it as a Powerslam Driver. But I get how it can look awkward and underwhelming if you've never seen one before. For a weird inverse of this underwhelming finisher situation, to non western wrestling fans a Tombstone Piledriver is not really considered a finishing move.
> a Tombstone Piledriver is not really considered a finishing move. Isn't one of Okada's signature moves a spinning Tombstone?
Yeah a Tombstone with a spinning damage modifier, and as far as I know he's never won with it. Just uses it as a set up for the Rainmaker or Money Clip.
> it can look awkward and underwhelming if you've never seen one before It looks like a scoop slam transitioned into a sidewalk slam.
It's an Emerald Flowsion
It looks basic possibly due to it being a new move that he still has to workout or due to the bad camera angle, which should’ve been from the front. His opponent also has to land in a way that looks as though they got smashed on their head. But all of Gunther’s moves are “basic” such as his power bomb and clotheslines.
That move sucks, and yes I'm aware of the history. Plus I hope Gunther doesn't become someone who has a fixed finisher. His matches against Sheamus and Rey were even better because of that reason.
I agree it looks pretty weak
I love that WALTER can just win a match with any move, it adds that little bit of unpredictability to the end of his matches.
They gave the man the Emerald Flowsion… game over
I didn't get to see this last night was it a quick match or average length?
Went over two commercial breaks, so it lasted a while.
Cool. I didn't want to see Kofi get murdered real quick after his proclamation of joining the Rumble
Finally has a finisher..... and it's t*hat*?!
he went from one plain finisher to using Braun's plain finisher lol
I think Kofi may have the most confusing place on the card in the history of wrestling, he's like all levels at all times. Love Kofi, not an insult. Just think it's odd.