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New Japan Pro Wrestling G1 Climax Tournament Day One: Part 2

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The heart of the card now begins as A Block competition initiates as IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Champion Will Osprey challenges hometown favorite, the returning Lance Archer, his first G1 in five years, and Ospreay is 1 of 2 junior heavyweights in the tournament.  A common theme throughout the night as faction warfare is an underlying storyline for every match as Osprey represents Chaos and Archer is a member of Suzuki-Gun. A classic story of David vs. Goliath as the diminutive Osprey used his speed and aerial assaults to try and chop down the bigger Archer. The 190-pound Ospreay was able to display surprising power against the 6-foot-8, 270-pound Archer. Archer’s size and shepherded him to a win over Ospreay as he pinned the jr. heavyweight using the Iron Claw, a move made famous by the Von Erich family in the Dallas-based wrestling organization World Class Championship Wrestling. 

More faction warfare as Bullet Club’s Bad Luck Fale defeated Los Ingobnerable de Japon’s Evil in another hoss battle as the larger Tongan Fale used a low blow followed by the Bad Luck Fall. 

The submission specialist British Heavyweight Champion, Zach Sabre Jr of Suzuki-Gun and Sanada of Los Ingobernables de Japon put on a technical masterpiece in their match. The combinations of styles, Sabre’s catch-wrestling mixed with British-style joint manipulation versus Sanada’s Japanese strong-style with a blend of Mexican Lucha Libre, a wrestling purist’s dream match. The chain-wrestling in this match as each wrestler exchanged an amalgamate number of holds and reversals incorporated with strikes with some aerial maneuvers. ZSJ tried to stretch Sanada, but the larger man was able to use superior athleticism to offset Sabre’s offense.  Sanada is victorious over ZSJ after numerous reversals into a pin. The sore loser ZSJ attacks a referee after the match. 
The Golden Star Kota Ibushi welcomes a returning Kenta. Ibushi was in the finals of the 2018 G1 and Kenta spent numerous uneventful years in the WWE as Hideo Itami. Kenta became famous in Pro Wrestling Noah, one of Japan’s other wrestling promotions, but now fights for NJPW. Ibushi vs. Kenta is another dream match. Kenta enters the ring wearing a “Takeover” shirt as a minor shot towards his former employer. A matchup that displays what Japanese wrestling is all about, the display of fighting spirit.  Both men were trained to use a blend of martial arts strikes with aerial mastery. Kenta defeated Ibushi after several stiff kicking strikes and finished with the Go To Sleep (GTS) after a fantastic Japanese strong-style match.
Professional wrestling’s most essential and longest-running storylines focus on rivalries to determine who is the best. The main event revisits clash of NJPW’s top two stars as “The Ace” Hiroshi Tanahashi battles reigning IWGP World Heavyweight Champion “Rainmaker” Kazuchika Okada. The first time these two fought in the United States. Tanahashi and Okada record versus each other in one-on-one competition is 5-5-3, and in the G1 they fought to three draws. Tanahashi is a 3-time winner of the G1 and defending champion as Okada is a 2-time winner of the event. The 42-year-old Tanahashi has had a recent resurgence in his career as the former 8-time IWGP Heavyweight Champion put on another classic with the heir to the throne the 5-time champion Okada. Tanahashi is responsible for the revitalization of NJPW over the past 20 years. The 31-year-old Okada is currently the face of NJPW.  The crowd is electric for the first time seeing these two battle live in America. Okada overcomes his rival with his Rainmaker finish, a ripcord clothesline to earn 2-points. Post-match, Okada spoke to the crowd to put over the show, his promotion. Okada spoke in English to the fans stating that not only is this the first time the G1 has been in America but not the last. 
The winners of this show are the fans of pro wrestling. NJPW does not insult the intelligence of the fans as they present wrestling as a sporting competition. It is a proven concept in sports that tournaments draw. Fans want to see who can outlast the opposition and only storylines needed is “I want to win this tournament and the main event in the Tokyo Dome at Wrestle Kingdom.” The commentators do a marvelous job of telling fans watching each wrestler’s history in the tournament giving the stats of each competitor, their records and how they compare. For a first-time viewer, this would have been a great way to introduce them to NJPW. The depth quality pro wrestling has not been this fantastic since the era of the territories in the 70s and 80s. NJPW G1 Climax Tournament Day One gets a 9/10. 

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New Japan Pro Wrestling G1 Climax Day One Review: Part 1

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Headlined by the continuation of the rivalry of Hiroshi Tanahashi versus reigning IWGP World Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada, Day 1 of the 29th New Japan Pro Wrestling G1 Climax Tournament kicked off at the American Airlines Arena in Dallas. Night one aired for free on AXS TV as NJPW looks to keep expanding their viewership to the American market over the past few years following up a great showing as they collaborated with Ring of Honor Wrestling in selling out Madison Square Garden in April. 

The G1 Climax tournament is a four-week round-robin tournament based on a point score system — the field of twenty broken into two ten competitor blocks (A Block and B Block). The scoring is 2-points for a win, 0-points for a loss, and 1-point for a draw. The winner of each block will face each other, and the winner earns the privilege to main event NJPW’s grandest show in January, Wrestle Kingdom.

A very live crowd viewed some of the best pure pro wrestling in the world. The opening contest scheduled for one fall featured former IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Tag Champions Sho and Yoh, Roppongi 3K versus the ROH and IWGP World Tag Team Champions Guerillas of Destiny, Toma Tonga, and Tonga Loa, representing Bullet Club. Sho and Yoh were not enough to take down the heavyweights as GOD won in just over six minutes. 

One feature that the G1 has that is very appealing is that the undercard of the show features competitors from the opposite group competing in tag-team matches to help showcase all the talent in the tournament. The second match of the show was a tag match of Jeff Cobb and Ren Narita vs. Tomohiro Ishii. Cobb and Ishii will face off opening the B Block as they teamed with two Young Lions from the NJPW Dojo. Cobb and Ishii gave a mammoth teaser for fans as they delivered stiff shots to each other. Cobb’s team won, but tensions rose post-match a brawl between the two fighters broke out. 

Faction warfare was next as Bullet Club’s Chase Owen’s and former IWGP World Champion Jay White challenged Hirooki Goto and Yoshi-Hashi of Chaos. Goto picks up the win for his team pinning Owens, but his G1 opponent, White, escapes up the ramp trash talking.

Up next is the legend, arguably the greatest junior heavyweight in the history of pro wrestling, Jushin Thunder Liger in the farewell tour of his 35-year-long career. Liger teamed with Juice Robinson and Toru Yano. They are challenging a trio from Los Ingobernables de Japon IWGP, led by current IWGP Intercontinental Champion and 2-time G1 Climax tournament winner Tetsuya Naito accompanied by Bushi and Shingo Takagi. Liger plays all the hits and Yano wins for his team as he rolls up Bushi after a low blow. 

Continued in part 2.

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Wrestlers Making Their Own Way.

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No longer is the WWE the end all be all for a professional wrestler in 2019. In recent history, dozens of unhappy “independent contractors” that worked with the largest wrestling promotion in the world have found extraordinary success in other organizations.
John Moxley, F.K.A Dean Ambrose in the WWE is the most recent person to blast off by betting on himself and working the upstart All Elite Wrestling (AEW).  Moxley then went to New Japan Pro Wrestling and won their United States Championship form another former WWE performer Juice Robinson, F.K.A CJ Parker.
Moxley stated many times how restrictive the WWE could be creative to wrestlers. Moxley has made the podcast tour and has aired displeasures with the creative team. Moxley has followed the model set by Cody Rhodes, who left WWE with his disapproval of not getting the opportunity to be the wrestler he believed he could be.
The list of wrestlers wanting out of their contracts with the WWE runs the gambit of talents in women, men, and tag teams. The biggest star that has made plenty of public statements of wanting to be set free is Sasha Banks. Banks has not appeared WWE television since WrestleMania. On that list include Luke Harper and the tag team The Revival. Many performers believe their prime years’ talent wasted with incoherent and ignorant storylines. Banks is a member of the WWE Four Horsewomen who is over with the fans, a great worker, celebrated on the mic, and has wrestled in a few of the best matches male or female in the past five years.
There have been plenty of wrestlers that have turned down WWE offers such as The Young Bucks, Kenny Omega and others, who all have gone on the found their promotion AEW with the financial backing of Tony Khan, son of the owner of the Jacksonville Jaguars. Khan, a lifelong wrestling fan, went into business himself with his biggest signing being Chris Jericho. Jericho spent nearly 20 years with the WWE and is now a top star in the upstart company.
Jericho has worked with NJPW as well. Jericho became their Intercontinental Champion as well a recently competing against Kazuchika Okada for the IWGP World Heavyweight Championship. Jericho will be in the main event for AEW in their next pay-per-view, All Out in Chicago August 31.
The movement is to the power of social media. Wrestlers do not need the backing of the WWE machine to expand their brand. Looking at many of the biggest stars in WWE now, Seth Rollins, AJ Styles, Samoa Joe, and half of the Raw, Smackdown and NXT rosters, all have made names for themselves outside of the WWE. Their names have become so big; the WWE had to offer them contracts. There are not too many WWE made stars on the roster as we speak.
Not to forget other promotions that have television deals with large social media followings such as Ring of Honor (ROH), Impact Wrestling, Major League Wrestling (MLW) and the resurgence to the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA).  Many of these organizations have working relationships where they share talent, primarily ROH, NJPW, and the NWA, which leads to new and innovative matchups; reminiscent to the territory era of wrestling since WWE put the final nail in that coffin in 2001.
Wrestlers now can bet on themselves to become the wrestler they want to be. No longer must a wrestler strive to WWE to make a name for themselves. Wrestling has not been as deep when it comes to the number of options performers can work.