Zack Sabre Jr. and Ryohei Oiwa of TMDK won this year’s tournament, defeating Yota Tsuji and Gabe Kidd in the finals. The closing minutes of the match had Kidd battling Oiwa until the latter blasted Kidd with a huge lariat. Kidd fell on top of his head and Oiwa covered him to win the tournament, setting up a likely IWGP Tag Team title match at Wrestle Kingdom 20 against current champions Knock Out Brothers (Yuto-Ice and Oskar).
After the match, it was Oiwa who cut a promo for the team, saying he was not a NPC, he was the main character and has gotten stronger by being a part of TMDK, thanking Sabre. He said they would be on top in 2026 and NJPW will also be on top. The show ended with streamers and the tournament winners posing with their trophies.
In comments made backstage following the show, Sabre told Oiwa that they had to take the titles from the Knock Out Brothers, saying they are a real tag team now.
Yuto-Ice and Oskar nearly made it to the finals before losing the B Block tiebreaker match against Sabre and Oiwa, who advanced to the finals with eight points. Tsuji and Kidd advanced to the finals from the A Block with 10 points, edging out Hirooki Goto and YOSHI-HASHI via tiebreaker.
The next challengers for the New Japan Strong Tag Team titles have been set.
Hiroshi Tanahashi & Tomohiro Ishii won a three-way tag team match to open Friday’s NJPW Capital Collision event in Washington DC. They defeated TMDK’s Bad Dude Tito & Robbie Eagles and The Grizzled Young Veterans after the duo isolated Tito, allowing Tanahashi to hit the high fly flow for the win.
Later in the show, champions Shane Haste & Mikey Nicholls retained the titles, defeating CMLL’s Hechicero and Virus. After the match, the new number one contenders came to the ring. Tanahashi announced that they wanted their tag team title match at Royal Quest on October 20 in London, and as the president of NJPW, he can make it official. TMDK ended up accepting their challenge.
TMDK have held the titles since June 9, when they defeated Kenta & Chase Owens and Bishamon (Hirooki Goto & YOSHI-HASHI) at Dominion to win both the NJPW Strong and IWGP Tag Team titles.
The current card for NJPW Royal Quest:
NJPW Strong Tag Team titles: TMDK defend against Hiroshi Tanahashi & Tomohiro Ishii
NJPW TV Champion Zack Sabre Jr. will be part of this month’s co-promoted Impact x NJPW Multiverse United pay-per-view.
Sabre Jr. will team with TMDK stablemate Shane Haste to take on Impact’s Moose & Eddie Edwards in tag team action on Sunday, August 20th in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
This will be Sabre Jr.’s first appearance in an Impact ring while Haste will make his first appearance since a short run this past February and March when he appeared in four matches, three of those with TMDK’s Bad Dude Tito.
Moose and Edwards have both feuded and teamed during their extensive runs in the company.
Only three matches have been announced, but former Impact Knockouts Champion Deonna Purrazzo called out the Stardom roster this week to appear at the show which is assumed to be leading to a match.
Here’s the current card:
Impact World Champion Alex Shelley defends against Hiroshi Tanahashi
Impact X-Division Champion Lio Rush & Trey Miguel vs. Hiromu Takahashi & Mike Bailey
NJPW TV Champion Zack Sabre Jr. & Shane Haste vs. Moose & Eddie Edwards
After this weekend’s Multiverse United event, Impact Wrestling will get back on the road to Rebellion this Thursday — two new matches for which were announced Saturday.
One is an Impact trilogy match as “Speedball” Mike Bailey will take on rival and partner Jonathan Gresham for the third time but with more stakes: an X-Division title shot at this month’s Rebellion pay-per-view.
A high-profile tag team match is also set as former Impact Tag Team Champions Motor City Machine Guns will take on TMDK (Shane Haste & Bad Dude Tito).
TMDK made their Impact debut as a team at last month’s Sacrifice streaming special, losing to current champions Chris Bey & Ace Austin.
The matches join the previously announced trios match involving Tommy Dreamer and Bully Ray, Josh Alexander relinquishing the Impact World title, and Jody Threat’s in-ring debut.
Here’s the current lineup:
Tommy Dreamer, Yuya Uemura & Darren McCarty vs. Bully Ray & The Good Hands
Jody Threat vs. TBA
TMDK vs. Motor City Machine Guns
Mike Bailey vs. Jonathan Gresham
Josh Alexander relinquishes the Impact World title
The Impact Tag Team titles will be on the line at next Friday’s Impact Sacrifice.
Bullet Club’s Ace Austin & Chris Bey will defend against TMDK (Shane Haste & Bad Dude Tito) who will be making their Impact debut as a team.
Haste made his Impact debut at the company’s Las Vegas TV taping in a loss to “Speedball” Mike Bailey while this will be Tito’s promotional debut.
This will be the first title defense for Austin & Bey who won the titles in late-February with their victory over the Motor City Machine Guns.
Both teams will be involved in a four-way for the titles at the following Thursday’s Impact x NJPW Multiverse United that also includes Aussie Open and the aforementioned Machine Guns.
Here’s the current lineup for the Friday, March 24th streaming special from Windsor, Ontario, California:
Impact World Champion Josh Alexander, Rich Swann & Frankie Kazarian vs. Time Machine (KUSHIDA & Motor City Machine Guns)
Impact Knockouts Champion Mickie James defends against Jordynne Grace
X-Division Champion Trey Miguel defends against TBA
Impact Tag Team Champions Bullet Club defend against TMDK
Saturday night saw more matches from NJPW Strong’s Ignition tapings in Hollywood, California, including a Strong Openweight Tag Team Championship Tournament semifinal match as the main event. Here are the results from the episode:
JR Kratos defeated Jordan Cruz
Kratos squashed Cruz in a very short match. Cruz mounted a quick comeback late in this, but the much larger Kratos caught him with a Claymore Kick before putting Cruz away with a powerslam into Boss Man Slam for the finish.
Kratos got into it with the audience before cutting a promo on his rival, Alex Coughlin. He challenged Coughlin to a Last Man Standing match in Charlotte, North Carolina. “You and me, bitch!”
Mascara Dorada, Rocky Romero & David Finlay defeated Negro Casas, Adrian Quest & Lucas Riley
This was Negro Casas’ NJPW Strong debut. He got a good reaction from the Hollywood crowd. David Finlay’s father, Fit Finlay, and Casas often wrestled together in NJPW back in the early 1990s. Ian Riccaboni explained that Casas is actually 2–0 over father Fit Finlay at the moment.
Finlay and Casas started things off and mixed it up on the mat. Quest landed on Dorada with a tornillo a few moments afterwards.
Later, LA’s Lucas Riley was able to counter Rocky Romero’s Forever clotheslines and was able to suplex Romero before tagging out to Casas. The two had a nice exchange together, and the live crowd seemed to love both Romero and Casas. Riley did a running Shooting Star Press onto Romero and earned a two count for it.
Dorada tagged in later and took Casas out with a rope-walk springboard dropkick. Finlay planted Quest with a uranage into a backbreaker.
Dorada and Finlay did dives to the floor, and Romero was able to put Riley away inside the ring with Sliced Bread to pick up the win for his team in just over 10 minutes.
Strong Openweight Tag Team Championship Tournament semifinal match: Christopher Daniels & Yuya Uemura defeated TMDK (Shane Haste & Mikey Nicholls)
TMDK jumped Daniels and Uemura before the bell sounded, but Daniels and Uemura recovered quickly and were soon on offense themselves.
There was a spot early on where Nicholls, who was standing on the floor, took Uemura’s head and bashed it against the ring apron, and it looked like this unintentionally busted Uemura’s nose open. It bled profusely for the remainder of the match. Nicholls began pulling and biting around Uemura’s face.
After about five minutes, Uemura, whose face was a mess by this point, was finally able to break free from TMDK, suplexing Haste, then tagging out to Daniels.
Daniels cleaned house. He tried doing an STO to Nicholls but it looked messed up. Daniels laid Haste out with a Blue Thunder Bomb, then called for Angel’s Wings on Nicholls, but Nicholls back body-dropped Daniels off his back, blocking the move. He laid Daniels out with a spinebuster, then connected with a low basement lariat for two. TMDK hit the Tankbuster to Daniels but only earned a two count for it.
Haste went for a diving lariat in the corner, but Daniels parried and rolled to Uemura for the tag. Uemura’s face was still very bloody. The crowd was loud for his comeback. He ran wild on TMDK with shoulder blocks and diving forearm shots. Uemura caught Nicholls with a beautiful dropkick, then screamed in Haste’s face before launching him with a release double overhook suplex. That was the highlight of the match, I think, the screaming suplex spot.
TMDK did a Tower of Power suplex but only earned two for it. The crowd rallied behind Uemura and chanted “YU-YA!” over and over. TMDK took Daniels out with a double-team pendulum slam maneuver. Uemura then reappeared and shoved Haste into Nicholls, which suddenly knocked Nicholls out of the ring. Uemura then leapt high and took Haste over with a standing Frankensteiner and pinned him for the win.
The crowd erupted, and the announcers treated this like a big upset. Daniels & Uemura advance to the upcoming finals in North Carolina.
Final Thoughts —
The main event wasn’t perfect, but it was good — and not for the reasons you initially might think of. I believe what really made the match special was Uemura’s performance in it. It was “fortuitous blood” that Uemura was able to take advantage of, turning the moment into an advantage. Uemura was able to make the match memorable.
Nick Miller of The Mighty has been released from WWE developmental.
WWE hasn’t officially announced the release, but Casey Michael of Squared Circle Sirens has reported that he has been cut. Dave Meltzer has also confirmed his release.
This comes after people pointed out on social media that the profiles of both he and NXT UK’s Tucker were removed from WWE.com. There is no word on the status of Tucker. Taishan Dong is also reported as being gone from the promotion, though that took place some time back.
Pro Wrestling Sheet noted that it wasn’t clear if Miller requested to be released, but a source told them he was looking to go back home for personal reasons. Dave Meltzer is reporting that Miller returned to Australia when his child was born and decided to stay. The door isn’t shut on him returning at some point if he chooses to.
Shane Thorne, Miller’s tag team partner, is still under WWE contract.
Before signing with the WWE, Miller and Thorne were known as Mikey Nicholls and Shane Haste of The Mighty Don’t Kneel (TMDK for short). They are best known for their run in Pro Wrestling NOAH from 2011 to 2016 where they won the GHC tag team titles on two occasions.
They signed with WWE in 2016 and were first given a run in NXT under the name TM-61, as babyfaces. After Thorne returned from an injury that kept him out for most of 2017, they feuded with the Street Profits, Heavy Machinery and The War Raiders. They eventually turned heel and were renamed The Mighty.
Their last appearance as a team were at the NXT television tapings that were held on November 28, losing to the team of Danny Burch & Oney Lorcan. That match aired just this past week on NXT.
Officially announcing what has been known for more about a year, WWE announced Friday that TMDK (The Mighty Don’t Kneel), a popular tag team from Japan, has signed with the company.
The team is made up of Michael Nicholls (Mikey Nicholls) and Shane Veryzer (Shane Haste), the top foreign tag team in Pro Wrestling NOAH until the arrival of the Killer Elite Squad (Lance Archer & Davey Boy Smith Jr.) from New Japan as part of the Suzuki-gun invasion in early 2015.
The two had reached an agreement last year to leave NOAH for WWE in 2015, but in working out their contract with NOAH, Haste suffered a knee injury that required surgery which put everything on hold. Nicholls & Haste returned to NOAH earlier this month for their farewell tour earlier this month.
The team was named Best Tag Team in Japan in 2013, a very difficult honor for a foreign team to win. They twice held the GHC tag team championship, and had a super hot series of matches for the titles with Masato Tanaka & Takashi Sugiura, the Dangan Yankees.
Both originally came from Perth, Western Australia and wrestled for years on the Australian independent scene before starting as regulars in Japan after passing a tryout in 2011.
