New Japan Pro Wrestling
World Tag League 2016: Night 12
December 2, 2016
Yamaguchi Refresh Park Gymnasium – Yamaguchi, Japan

Watch: NJPW World

Katsuyori Shibata & Yuji Nagata def. Bullet Club (Bad Luck Fale & BONE SOLDIER)

As I’ve mentioned in some of my previous World Tag League reviews, this Bad Luck Fale/Bone Soldier tandem is clearly the worst team in the B Block, but if they’re facing off with the right opponents, they could have an acceptable match. Shibata & Nagata have been one of the better teams in the B Block, so I went in with an optimistic attitude. Unfortunately, this match sucked.

It was easily the worst match that Shibata & Nagata have had in this tournament. A lot of it (obviously) has to do with their opponents, but I’m not totally absolving Shibata & Nagata of any blame, because they didn’t do a good job in this match either. Even though their were bright spots, I feel as though Shibata & Nagata saw this as a night off, and treated it as such. The action was mostly boring, and we did get some crowd brawling as well as a referee bump, which certainly didn’t help the match. Bone Soldier took the fall here, as per usual. Part of me does feel really bad for Bad Luck Fale.  *3/4

Great Bash Heel (Togi Makabe & Tomoaki Honma) def. Los Ingobernables de Japon (EVIL & SANADA)

After the trainwreck that was the previous tournament match, I went into this match hoping that GBH & LIJ would give us a match that would save this show from being a total waste of time. While these two teams did manage to deliver a good match, I don’t know if it was enough to make this show redeemable. The first half seemed relatively slow, and just didn’t connect with me at all. Fortunately, the action did pick up in the second half, and it got me back into the match. The crowd helped out a little bit as well. They were very much behind Makabe & Honma. Eventually, GBH were able to pick up the victory, which meant that they were now level with LIJ at in the overall standings at 6 Points. GBH & LIJ (along with Shibata & Nagata, to an extent) have been the “middle of the road” teams in the B Block thus far. They’ve been putting on very good performances throughout the tournament, but they haven’t been as good as the two CHAOS teams. Again, this particular match was pretty solid, but it’s the kind of match that you’ll easily forget about the next day. ***¼

Final Thoughts: 

This was by far the worst outing from the B Block thus far in the tournament. Shibata & Nagata vs. Bad Luck Fale & Bone Soldier was a complete waste of time, and should be avoided. While Makabe & Honma vs. EVIL & SANADA was, for the most part, good, it didn’t exactly set the world on fire either. Unless you really want to see the main event, you can pretty much skip this show.