The original alternate returns with a bit of banter ‘bout Japan…just sliding in before the end of the month.
After a short reintroduction, yours truly and Adam Summers talk about the state of the current team leagues: New Japan’s World Tag, and All Japan’s original recipe Real World Tag.
Also, as WWE continues to sink their tentacles into everything globally, there’s something to consider about future WrestleMania weekends.
Plus, Being The Change you wish to see in the World, Katsuhiko Nakajima is a glorious bastard, some thoughts on random matches, and more.
It’s the other two guys who talk about Japan on this site: The Adam and Mike BIG AUDIO NIGHTMARE~!
Just when I thought I had the answers, New Japan changed the questions.
After eight nights, the 2017 World Tag League featured a competitive A Block, and a B Block that had one dominant team. All of that has changed after the last two shows.
Entering night eleven, four teams sit tied atop the B Block, while the A Block features a six-way tie for second place. Who will emerge from the A Block? Who will conquer the B Block? Your guess is as good as mine.
Elsewhere in New Japan, Tetsuya Naito and Kazuchika Okada remain in each others’ orbit as their January 4th IWGP Heavyweight Championship match looms.
Okada once again got the upper hand on Naito in a tag match on November 30th at Korakuen Hall. Although Naito did get the pinfall, Okada got the best of their exchanges in the bout. It seems clear that Naito will be the one to end Okada’s reign, and the people are ready for that if the crowd response in Korakuen is any indicator. Before being leveled by Okada, Naito fired up, and the sense that the audience wanted to see Naito get the advantage on Okada was palpable.
The Tokyo Dome will be electric, come January 4th, 2018.
Night nine results –
Death Juice (Juice Robinson & Sami Callihan) defeated Yuji Nagata & Manabu Nakanishi (A Block)
Nagata and Robinson started and figured to work most of the way, but Nakanishi and Callihan quickly tagged in for a chop battle. This was the best that Nakanishi has looked so far in the tournament, largely due to Robinson and Callihan bumping all over the building for him.
Nagata and Callihan worked well together, with Juice interfering at will. Nagata hit an exploder suplex on Callihan, throwing him onto Robinson, who was seated in the corner. Robinson and Callihan tried to suplex Nakanishi, but he suplexed both of them at once instead. That was scary, as Callihan almost got dropped on his head. Robinson and Callihan hit Nakanishi with their double team move for the victory.
Hirooki Goto & YOSHI-HASHI defeated Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima (A Block)
Kojima ran wild on Goto in the early going and flexed his pecs. Tenzan and Kojima worked over YOSHI-HASHI, who continues to look dreadful in this tournament. He just sticks out like a sore thumb when you’re exposed to all these guys who are so fundamentally sound, if nothing else. I don’t mean to totally bury the guy, so I’ll also mention that he throws a nice superkick.
The place went crazy when Kojima started doing his trademark spots on YOSHI-HASHI. They traded strikes in the middle of the ring until Goto tagged in and worked over Kojima. They did a great near fall on Kojima, but Goto scored the pin on him seconds later anyway. Kojima is still pretty great.
Minoru Suzuki & Takashi Iizuka defeated Bad Luck Fale & Chase Owens (A Block)
Suzuki and Iizuka jumped Fale and Owens as they made their entrance, and the teams brawled through the crowd. Ultimately, Suzuki and Owens made their way to the ring and the match started.
Very quickly, though, Suzuki took things back to the outside and chased Owens through the audience, hammering him with guardrails and chairs. Iizuka and Fale brawled at the opposite end of the arena, but the camera largely focused on Suzuki and Owens, thank goodness.
As they worked back to the ring, Suzuki worked on Owens with a kimura, before he and Iizuka traded off taking the ref while the other choked Owens. Fale and Iizuka tagged in, and, given their limitations, it went about as well as it could have.
Suzuki sold a lot for Owens and Fale, and Owens in particular looked excellent as a result. The finish saw El Desperado take the referee, allowing Iizuka to use the iron hand on Owens. Suzuki then hit the Gotch piledriver to pick up the win.
SANADA & EVIL defeated Hangman Page & Yujiro Takahashi (A Block)
Takahashi and EVIL started off and did very basic stuff, which to their credit, the crowd loved. Things picked up after Page posted SANADA’s knee and hit it with a chair. The crowd really got in to SANADA’s selling.
EVIL tagged in and ran wild on the Bullet Club before yielding to SANADA, who continued to have his leg worked over. He recovered long enough to hit the Magic Killer on Takahashi, with some assistance from his partner, scoring the fall for their team. This was pretty average, but the crowd seemed to like it a lot.
Night 10 results –
Guerrillas of Destiny defeated David Finlay & Katsuya Kitamura (B Block)
Tama Tonga and Kitamura had a hilarious chop battle early on, which the crowd loved. Finlay got more offense than you might expect, looking excellent in doing so. Kitamura continues to keep it very basic, as he should.
Finlay broke up a near fall, then Kitamura kicked out of a Blue Thunder Bomb before succumbing to Tanga Loa’s finisher.
The story of this match was Henare displaying an ability to take a beating and keep fighting. He got destroyed early on but kept firing up after. When working with someone like Ishii, this was bound to get over, and it did.
They did a great near fall with Henare hitting Ishii with a spear, which the crowd totally bought as the finish. Henare kicked out of one pinning predicament but succumbed to Ishii’s brainbuster.
Best Friends (Beretta & Chuck Taylor) defeated Michael Elgin & Jeff Cobb (B Block)
Taylor was absolutely more over on this night than he has been at any point yet in the tournament, even eliciting a “Chuckie T” chant at the opening bell.
All four guys had their working boots on, and they had a really good match. The place went nuts for Elgin and Cobb’s power stuff, as usual, and they came up with some innovative spots that I’ve never seen, including a vertical suplex where they passed Beretta back and forth to each other while maintaining the suplex.
Taylor and Beretta were on point with their aerial tactics as well. Taylor hit a crazy dive from the top rope in to the crowd. Beretta’s selling isn’t my cup of tea, but he did the bulk of it for his team, and did a fine job.
The place went crazy for the near falls, and the match felt like it reached its climax at the perfect time. Taylor and Beretta hit Strong Zero on Cobb to pick up the win.
War Machine defeated Killer Elite Squad (B Block)
These guys tried their best to follow the previous match, which was quite the tall order, but they were successful.
Lance Archer and Davey Boy Smith Jr. have been positioned as the dominant star team of the tournament so far, and the crowd reacted to them as such, responding in a big way when they lost.
This was four mean guys having a fight, but in an artful way. They looked like they were beating each other up, but with worked or safe forearms and strikes, rather than wailing on each other for real. There’s a time and place for chops, but they can be a crutch.
They did a great spot late in the match where all four guys missed moves from the top rope, and ended up down and selling, which set up the last few minutes nicely. Hanson broke up a near fall after a Hart Attack. Archer broke up a near fall after Fallout, but Smith eventually fell victim to the same move.
Standings after night 10 —
A Block
Death Juice (Juice Robinson & Sami Callihan) — 6
Bad Luck Fale & Chase Owens — 4
Hangman Page & Yujiro Takahashi — 4
Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima — 4
Hirooki Goto & YOSHI-HASHI — 4
Minoru Suzuki & Takashi Iizuka — 4
SANADA & EVIL — 4
Manabu Nakanishi & Yuji Nagata – 2
B Block
Killer Elite Squad (Davey Boy Smith Jr. & Lance Archer) — 6
War Machine (Ray Rowe & Hanson) — 6
Best Friends (Beretta & Chuck Taylor) — 6
Guerrillas of Destiny (Tama Tonga & Tanga Loa) — 6
This year’s World Tag League tournament comes to a close in Miyagi tonight at one of New Japan Pro Wrestling’s last stops before the Tokyo Dome.
We’re looking for your thoughts on the show, so you can leave a thumbs up, thumbs down or thumbs in the middle along with a best and worst match to [email protected]
In the show’s main event, Togi Makabe and Tomoaki Honma will face IWGP Tag Team Champions Guerrillas of Destiny in the finals of this year’s tournament. Makabe and Honma will likely challenge for the titles on January 4th if they defeat the champions.
Perhaps the most hyped thing on the show is the reveal of a new member of the Bullet Club. We will also likely get more announcements for the Tokyo Dome either here or in the next couple days.
The undercard of the show will feature tag matches that will build to the top Dome bouts, with Kazuchika Okada teaming with Tomohiro Ishii against Kenny Omega and Hangman Page. And Hiroshi Tanahashi and KUSHIDA will take on Tetsuya Naito and Rush.
Our live coverage kicks off at 3 a.m. ET.
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JUSHIN LIGER & TIGER MASK VS. RYUSUKE TAGUCHI & DAVID FINLAY
Basic match, with Liger and Taguchi doing their usual stuff. About what you’d expect with it seeming like Liger & Tiger Mask were about to win when out of nowhere Finlay pinned Liger with a cradle. Liger first complained about a fast count but then shook Finlay’s hand and raised his hand and all four raised each others’ hands.
YUJIRO TAKAHASHI & BAD LUCK FALE VS. MANABU NAKANISHI & HENARE
Pretty bad, but at least it was short. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen Nakanishi vs. Fale. Nakanishi & Henare did double Mil Mascaras & Dos Caras style cross chops on both guys, which is about the only time they would be compared to Mascaras & Caras. Yujiro pinned Henare after a fisherman buster and a DDT, which is called pimp juice.
YOSHITATSU & BILLY GUNN VS. BONE SOLDIER & CHASE OWENS
Another short match with not much to it. Mostly Gunn and Owens doing moves to each other and swearing at each other. Yoshitatsu laid out Owens with a plancha and Billy pinned Bone with a famouser. Billy found a guy in the crowd with a DX shirt and posed with him after. Very rare to have two straight New Japan matches like this, but not a surprise.
WAR MACHINE VS. LELAND RACE & BRIAN BREAKER
War Machine won of course when Hanson came off the top rope with a leg drop while Rowe had Race up in the air. The crowd liked War Machine but this wasn’t the best showcase for them. The highlight was a spot where Rowe missed a tope, nailing a rookie. Race & Breaker were working on him when Hanson did a flip plancha off the top rope to the floor on all three.
SATOSHI KOJIMA & HIROYOSHI TENZAN & YUJI NAGATA VS. SEIYA SANADA & EVIL & BUSHI
Best match so far,but still nothing speical. Kojima hit the diamond cutter on Evil after hitting the 3-D on Sanada. Bushi blew mist in Kojima’s eyes as the ref was distrated and then Evil got a near fall with the darkness fall on Kojima and then got the pin with the STO, which is called Evil. No angle or anything coming out of this.
The entire Bullet Club is coming out for the big announcement right now. Kenny Omega has a t-shirt that reads “Best bout machine.” Omega is he leader. He said Bone Soldier was an intergallactic disaster. He said it was Ry, and then stopped and said he will not speak Japanese. He said he’s brought a video. A vdieo was shown of Cody Rhodes smoking a cigar in a room full of candles. He’s Cody the American Nightmare.
Omega said it was Cody Rhodes, so he used the name. Omega said you may be cheering, you may wish it was someone else but things will change and phase two of the Bullet Club’s Global takeover begins.
Intermission time.i
KATSUYORI SHIBATA & JUICE ROBINSON VS. HIROOKI GOTO & YOSHI-HASHI
The stuff with Goto vs Shibata was good, but not great. Shibata had Goto beaten twice but Yoshi-Hashi saved him each time. Yoshi-Hashi then gave Shibata running double knees and Goto used the GTR and pinned Shbata. Goto then grabbed the belt, so we’ll have Shibata vs. Goto for the Never Open Weight title at the Tokyo Dome. They were best friends from high school wrestlng and have had great matches in the past but it feels like somethig done before.
HIROSHI TANAHASHI & KUSHIDA VS. TETSUYA NAITO & RUSH
They were having the best match on the show with Tanahashi laying Naito out with a planha and Kushida having Rush in the hoverboard lock. Hiromu Takahashi (Kamaitachi) came out and distrated Kushida. Takahashi threw Tanahashi into the ref who went down. Naito kicked Tanahashi low and Takahashi laid out Kushida with a TKO live move. Rush then used the Rush driver to pin Kushida. After the match Naito offered Takahashi a Los Ingobernables baseball cap. Takahashi put it on for a pretty big pop. That’s probably the most newsworthy thing to the crowd so far.
This was pretty good. Lots of hot action with Okada vs. Omega. They’ll have a great match at the Dome but that goes without saying. Omega kept escaping rainmaker attempts and Okada got escaping One winged angel attempts. A lot of good action with Ishii vs. Omega. Okada used a tombstone piledriver and rainmaker to pin Page. After the match when Okada was celebrating, Omega hit the one winged angel. Gedo yelled at Omega to leave. Of course Omega laid out Gedo with a running knee. Omega then gave Gedo the one winged angel. He put Gedo on top of Omega and put his foot on Gedo’s chest and celebrated. Heat wasn’t super for it but it was the basic angle you’d do in this situation. Omega said I just killed Okada and his father. Okada had to be helped out.
TOMOAKI HONMA & TOGI MAKABE VS. TAMA TONGA & TANGA ROA IN THE 2016 TAG TEAM TOURNAMENT FINAL
Excellent match. They went about 27 minutes teasing all kinds of twists and turns and near falls. There were a few scary spots such as when Tonga used a gunstun on Makabe as he came off the top rope for the kneedroip and it wasn’t exactly perfect. Easily the best Tonga & Roa match I’ve seen and Tonga really performed at the toip guy main event level here. At another point Honma was power bombed off the apron through a table by Roa. They destroyed Makabe including giving him the Magic killer but Honma made the last second save. The finish saw Tonga go for he gun stun on Honma on the apron but Honma got out of it and nailed Tonga with a kokeshi, knocking him off the apron. In the ring, Makabe put Roa on his shoulders and Honma came off with a head-butt spear, the kokeshi impact, then Honma used a diving head-butt on Roa and Makabe followed with a kneedrop off the top the pin.
Of course Makabe & Honma said they wanted a tag team title match after this. This is one where the quality of this match made the tag title match feel a lot bigger than it looked on paper.
