NJPW (Discussion)

[Tigerkinney]

I have watched WTL sporadically but in general B block nights have been passable to good. This last Korauken Hall was B block and it was very good all around including the undercard. A Block is struggling because it has the filler Bullet Club teams and Nakanishi slowing things down

I'll agree with that. The B-Block nights have in general produced a decent selection of matches, nothing (the last 2 matches at the last Korakuen show apart) I would especially recommend but you won't come away thinking can I please have an hour of my life back.

The A-Block on the other hand has been pretty dire, sloth like Nakanishi, Bullet Club 'Black and White' and tedious Suzukigun bullshit are really dragging that Block down.

[Guilherme Jaeger]

It was a shower thought, but now I've been thinking about this a lot: my (really, really) fantasy booking for Omega/Ibushi at WK13 would be gunning for a split reaction. I would do it such as that Omega, after beating Jericho, faces top outsiders for the US belt, elevating it's prestige and becoming sort of a defender of NJPW's greatness. Riddle, Patrón, Cody, Punk, Batista, Bryan. Names escalating in star power, with Cody after Patrón only because it would be the big singles match following the split of Bullet Club into BC and Elite. Meanwhile, Ibushi, and his first order of business is to beat Tanahashi in a big match. It takes him two times (he loses at NJ Cup and G1), but then he asks Tana for a big singles at King of Pro Wrestling and finally does surpass his god. Then, he SIGNS A FUCKING CONTRACT and challenges Omega for the US Title, who at this point would be red hot because of fucking course he would after beating Punk, Batista and Bryan. So we have a different sort of defender vs. outsider, for NJPW's standards, as well as a huge star on the top of his game in Omega vs. a redemption story in Ibushi.

I really like fantasy booking a lot.

[suplexberry]

Honestly, one of the best ways to catch up with WTL is not to watch the matches but burn through the backstage promo playlists on the English youtube channel. I've gotten so much out of those things, but none of it includes getting my enthusiasm killed by middle-of-the-road tags. (If you have time, interest and energy to watch the matches, by all means, do it, cool. I'm watching very selectively and watching the promos more carefully.)

Some notes:

- I think Sami Callihan can cut effective promos and is by no means bad, but watch through his promos with Juice, and you see how they're worlds apart. Sami seems to be trying always to do something off-beat and "interesting", maybe a bit goofy or unpredictable, because that can be the hook for a lot of promos in the West. Juice cuts a very by-the-book promo, like the NJPW babyfaces typically do, but it just works, every time. He does bring his own personality into it, but it's serious, it's determined, it's about what just happened and what is going to happen next. His promos have no 'hook', no 'gimmick' but they just work. Simple, effective.

- Tanahashi is in such an odd place because he's cutting promos on a guy who isn't there, but he still does good. He's also mentioned Ibushi in his promos, saying their story is not over yet. It's ...interesting.

- Naito throwing shade on WTL, calling it the worst ever makes me laugh. EVIL took offence to it, and Hiromu is excited by the small tiff within their faction. (Every Hiromu promo so far has been incredible.)

- Okada is coming off like a jerk, which is pretty much perfect. He always brings up "being in a hurry" (because 'asennayo' means 'don't be in a hurry'). Naito has been pretty damn great in countering him, though. The new submission Okada used? Naito's reply, "Isn't it the challenger who usually brings in new moves to defeat the champion?". He also said Okada debuting a new submission gives him time to figure out ways to counter it. I'm hyped for this main event.

- Best Friends have had the perfect balance of being themselves and comedic but not too comedic to not be credible.

- The next time somebody asks you why NJPW has so many tag matches, just show them the Tenzan promo where he praises young guys for fighting hard and says, with a smile, that he didn't himself even break a sweat.

[rollup]

Wonder if they will continue to use Don Callis as an announcer now that he is affiliated with Impact

[John The Drummer]

Interested to see if the chemistry between Elgin and Cobb will change since those texts got released >___>

[suplexberry]

Wonderland with Tanahashi, subtitled in full:



Gotta give props to NJPW for the effort they have put into English translations this year, and what a great time to be a fan. I thought that translated stuff in text form on the website was all we'd ever get, along with English commentary for some big shows. But we've gotten so much good stuff, from interviews to subtitled backstage promos, and English commentary has actually got very good. Kevin Kelly is keeping up and doing his homework, even going beyond what I personally expected him to do.

I think it's helped some wrestlers endear themselves to the English speaking fandom, too. Hiromu's character would not be half as interesting or great if we didn't get to see his promo work. Taguchi, too. And getting video of the backstage comments is what made me connect to Juice during the G1 a lot.

I hope new fans appreciate and don't take this stuff for granted, because as a newish fan who began watching 4ish years ago, I sure don't. Back then I loved the matches and connected to the characters a lot, but the picture wasn't as fully colored as it is now. There's so much more intriguing character stuff we actually can learn about very easily now, thanks to all the translations, both official and unofficial.

[PKThree]

Kinda NJPW related through Sakuraba. He has a new grappling event coming up named Quintet. It's team based grappling and sounds cool as hell.

[Danwaka]

Okay, I'm hooked.

[Frank Olson]

The Best Friends vs. K.E.S. and Elgin/Cobb vs. War Machine matches from today's show are well worth a watch. I've maybe seen a dozen matches from the entire World Tag League, but based on what little I've seen it seems like Best Friends were the MVPs of the tournament, although I can't imagine Chuck Taylor really fitting in as a regular member of the New Japan roster (especially outside the context of being Beretta's partner). Elgin's Twitter messages have not made him popular with certain members of the roster; War Machine seemed to be really beating the shit out of him with some of their strikes, and after the match Rowe looked directly into the camera and said “fuck Michael Elgin.” Yikes.

EVIL/SANADA vs. G.O.D. is kind of an interesting finals match in the sense that it is a completely fresh matchup that we haven't seen before, but also kind of uninteresting in the sense that G.O.D. are almost certainly going to win (since LIJ will presumably be defending the NEVER 6-man titles on January 4th). I also still think that the fact that War Machine defeated K.E.S. during the tournament means that we are going to see yet another three-way match between K.E.S., G.O.D. and War Machine, even though I can't imagine a single person on Earth who would be excited to see that again.

So here's my nerdy speculation on what the unannounced portion of the Wrestle Kingdom card will look like...

NEVER 6-MAN TITLE GUANTLET: LIJ (EVIL, SANADA, BUSHI) vs. CHAOS (Tomohiro Ishii, Toru Yano, YOSHI-HASHI) vs. Taguchi Japan (Ryusuke Taguchi, Juice Robinson, Michael Elgin) vs. Bullet Club (Bad Luck Fale, Yujiro Takahashi, Hangman Page) vs. Suzukigun (Zack Sabre Jr, Taichi, Yoshinobu Kanemaru)

IWGP HEAVYWEIGHT TAG TEAM TITLE THREE-WAY: K.E.S. vs. War Machine vs. G.O.D.

NEVER OPENWEIGHT TITLE IN SOME SORT OF DUMB GIMMICK MATCH: Minoru Suzuki vs. Hirooki Goto

After the way this past year has played out I think it would make more sense for Ishii to be the CHAOS member challenging for the NEVER Title while Goto should be on the CHAOS 6-man team, but Suzuki vs. Goto is pretty obviously the direction they are going in. I'd also like to see Beretta and El Desperado each get a spot somewhere on the card, but with this stacked roster I feel that they are both probably destined for the Rambo.

[Leo C]

The Best Friends vs. K.E.S. and Elgin/Cobb vs. War Machine matches from today's show are well worth a watch. I've maybe seen a dozen matches from the entire World Tag League, but based on what little I've seen it seems like Best Friends were the MVPs of the tournament, although I can't imagine Chuck Taylor really fitting in as a regular member of the New Japan roster (especially outside the context of being Beretta's partner). Elgin's Twitter messages have not made him popular with certain members of the roster; War Machine seemed to be really beating the shit out of him with some of their strikes, and after the match Rowe looked directly into the camera and said “fuck Michael Elgin.” Yikes.

EVIL/SANADA vs. G.O.D. is kind of an interesting finals match in the sense that it is a completely fresh matchup that we haven't seen before, but also kind of uninteresting in the sense that G.O.D. are almost certainly going to win (since LIJ will presumably be defending the NEVER 6-man titles on January 4th). I also still think that the fact that War Machine defeated K.E.S. during the tournament means that we are going to see yet another three-way match between K.E.S., G.O.D. and War Machine, even though I can't imagine a single person on Earth who would be excited to see that again.

So here's my nerdy speculation on what the unannounced portion of the Wrestle Kingdom card will look like...

NEVER 6-MAN TITLE GUANTLET: LIJ (EVIL, SANADA, BUSHI) vs. CHAOS (Tomohiro Ishii, Toru Yano, YOSHI-HASHI) vs. Taguchi Japan (Ryusuke Taguchi, Juice Robinson, Michael Elgin) vs. Bullet Club (Bad Luck Fale, Yujiro Takahashi, Hangman Page) vs. Suzukigun (Zack Sabre Jr, Taichi, Yoshinobu Kanemaru)

IWGP HEAVYWEIGHT TAG TEAM TITLE THREE-WAY: K.E.S. vs. War Machine vs. G.O.D.

NEVER OPENWEIGHT TITLE IN SOME SORT OF DUMB GIMMICK MATCH: Minoru Suzuki vs. Hirooki Goto

After the way this past year has played out I think it would make more sense for Ishii to be the CHAOS member challenging for the NEVER Title while Goto should be on the CHAOS 6-man team, but Suzuki vs. Goto is pretty obviously the direction they are going in. I'd also like to see Beretta and El Desperado each get a spot somewhere on the card, but with this stacked roster I feel that they are both probably destined for the Rambo.

I'm thinking LIJ are going to win the Tag League and drop the 6 man belts on one of the Road to Tokyo Dome shows. So on WK we'll get a four way with KES, War Machine and GOD again plus EVIL and SANADA.

[Rainmaker_F7]

Would it be a problem to have LIJ just vacate the belts and BUSHI be in the the trios match with two mystery partners? That wouldn't be a big deal and New Japan has done the X gimmick many times before. God I fucking hope the Tag title match is not a 3 or 4 way. You could just do ZSJ and KES and GOD with Fale in the trios clusterfuck and put Taichi, Kanemaru, Yujiro and Page in the Rambo, no one will even give a shit.

Also Suzuki vs Goto...yeez. I mean, it will probably be pretty good, but why not Ishii vs Goto? Why not you know, a fresh match that makes sense?

[Garuda]

As far as there being nothing for Ishii to do, I imagine he's going to be in the CHAOS team for the trios belt again.

Familiar, but I don't expect them to book outside of the box on this one.

[suplexberry]

If they book that threeway or a fourway for Dome, god fucking help us.

Honestly, it was time to give Taguchi Japan the 6-man belts this fall, because Taguchi + 2 whoevers would be the perfect, perfect team for it, particularly if the configuration didn't include Ricochet (not on every tour, then leaving). Say, Taguchi, Juice & KUSHIDA. LIJ is also a great team for it, but you really do get the sense they all need to move on. EVIL is so fucking good these days, he without a doubt has a few main events in his 2018.

BUSHI vs Bad Luck Fale is a genuine special singles match on tomorrow's card. Circle it, underline it, write it on your calendar (BUSHI pinned Fale at Power Struggle if my memory serves me correct?)

[frankpellow]

Although i got a little behind at points i have now caught up in my quest to watch all the tag league. It wasn't an unpleasant experience but there were very few matches i would stick my neck out and recommend viewing.
I was really impressed with Lance Archer and his ability to get a reaction from any crowd. There's such quality in the New Japan roster that it's very rare i don't get an appreciation when i watch someone in a run of matches.
Sami & Juice were the most impressive team for me although Sami constant efforts to get the crowd clapping (even during the most unneeded stretch) irked me. I hope they team more although not at the expense of the joy of Juice singles matches.
Best Friends got more serious as the tour went on and got better as a result. The best matches of the tour were probably theirs versus Elgin & Cobb (probably the only match that is must see) and KES.
Other particularly good matches were Sanada & EVIL v Goto & YH on the final night of block A action (YH's over the top offense is worlds better when Goto's knee is involved) and War Machine v GOD (which they worked in an impressive athletic/speedy style unlike their other more brawly matches).
Henare did well on his return and looks very promising. Kitamura had some rough interactions (including a winch inducing couple of minutes with Elgin) but got great reactions. Elgin has incorporated more energy to his performances and was great all tour.
The crowds were really good and reacted well to all the action. A receptive crowd really brings me into the action and adds a lot to my enjoyment so they got me through many of the numerous shows.
Am i right in thinking there were two new Young Lions helping at ringside? They wore tracksuits (and not the tour tshirts like the others) and were most noticeable later in the tour when Fale leathered one of them and the other came and carried him off. The reason i'm not sure if they are YL or NJPW staff is they seemed quite sedate in comparison to Kawato and the others when it came to protecting the crowd.

[Tigerkinney]

BUSHI vs Bad Luck Fale is a genuine special singles match on tomorrow's card. Circle it, underline it, write it on your calendar (BUSHI pinned Fale at Power Struggle if my memory serves me correct?)

Your memory does serve you correct. I imagine Fale, will get his revenge here, can't see them having BUSHI pull another upset over Fale, especially in the context of a singles match.

Speaking of BUSHI, I'll be rooting for EVIL & SANADA to win the WTL tomorrow but in a lot of ways I will feel a bit sorry for BUSHI if they do win, as it will be a shame to see him left with nothing to do at Wrestle-Kingdom, other than compete in the Rambo and maybe try to help Hiromu in the Junior title 4-way. Saying that I'm still leaning towards wanting L.I.J to win WTL as I really don't need to see another G.O.D vs K.E.S vs War Machine 3-way, which is what I fear will happen if G.O.D win the tournament.