New Japan Pro-Wrestling are now firmly into the build up to their next big show Wrestling Dontaku, which takes place in Fukuoka on 5/3. Sadly, Japan had to deal with some big time Earthquakes that hit Kumamoto pretty hard including a 6.0 and 7.0 Earthquake, which killed over 40 people and injured countless others. As a result, NJPW had to cancel their Wrestling Hi No Kuni event on 4/29, which was set to take place there. However, they did promise to return to Kumamoto soon and gave $100,000 in relief. NJPW as well as several other wrestling promotions around Japan will be doing relief efforts for Kumamoto at their shows as well.
New Japan Pro-Wrestling: NJPW Road To Wrestling Dontaku Review (4/23)
Location: Bunkyo, Tokyo, Japan inside Korakuen Hall
Since the event had to be cancelled, New Japan divided the big matches on that card and moved some of them to the 4/27 show at Hakata Star Lane and also made Wrestling Dontaku even bigger by moving some of the matches onto that show as well. So, there is certainly a lot to look forward to in the coming days from the top wrestling promotion in Japan.
This event is your normal house show, but New Japan decided to put this and their 4/24 show on NJPW World. The Road to Wrestling Dontaku show does not have commentary as you’d expect and only has a six match card. Hopefully, it should be an enjoyable show that is easy to watch.
Match 1: Six-Man Tag Team Match: Manabu Nakanishi, Ryusuke Taguchi, & Tiger Mask IV vs. Gedo (NJPW Booker) & (IWGP Jr. Tag Team Champions) Roppongi Vice (ALL CHAOS)
Winners: Nakanishi, Taguchi, & Tiger Mask IV (After Nakanishi makes Gedo TAP OUT to the Torture Rack)
I always enjoy Gedo every time we get to see him wrestling. He yells English curse words at his tag partners, he sells like a literal mad man, and he has no problem taking the fall in matches. He understands that the show isn’t about him and that most of all it should be about having fun. This is all this was, a fun six-man, which allowed the older talent to shine. Beretta being scared of Nakanishi made me chuckle, Gedo and Beretta having fun with a simple face twist spot made me smile, and Rocky cursing at Taguchi before he takes a Hip Attack is just your normal Rocky Romero. It’s a little slow in spots, but there’s a good mix of comedy, action, and it has a nice ending sequence with Taguchi and Tiger Mask doing dives before Nakanishi makes Gedo tap out. The best part was seeing Nakanishi barely able to do a Hip Attack. God Bless Nakanishi for going out there and still trying.** and ¾ *
Match 2: Tomoaki Honma & Togi Makabe (Great Bash Heel) vs. Jay White & David Finlay Jr. (Young Lions)
Winners: G-B-H (After Honma hits the Fire Thunder Driver on Finlay Jr.)
We found out this week that Jay White will be doing his Young Lion excursion in Ring of Honor, which will be great for him and for the fans that will get to see him work with some terrific talents, while he continues to hone his skills as a wrestler. White and Finlay Jr. Are such good wrestlers already, it’s certainly going to be interesting to see what they are like a few years down the road when they are even better.
Speaking of interesting, I guess you could say that about this match. There was a story here with Jay and Makabe. Jay at one point slapped Makabe and they had some neat exchanges the two different times they were in the ring. Jay looked like he belonged and they could have easily been having a singles match and it wouldn’t have made much difference. The crowd wasn’t too into this, probably because they are used to seeing Honma being the one that’s beatdown for a lot of the match, instead those roles were reversed as Honma took it to Finlay. This caused the match to drag a bit when these two were in the ring. Not because anything was bad, just Honma being the aggressor doesn’t play to his strengths. Finlay got some hope spots in there, with his flying Dropkick and the Finlay Roll, which livened the crowd up a little, but not a whole lot. Honma put Finlay away viciously with the Fire Thunder Driver and that was all she wrote. ** and ¾ *
Match 3: Captain New Japan & Juice Robinson vs. (IWGP Heavyweight Tag Team Champions) Tama Tonga & Tanga Loa (Guerrilas of Destiny, Bullet Club)
Winners: Guerrilas of Destiny (After their Tag Finisher, A.K.A. MNM’s Snapshot)
You could have heard a pin drop in the arena when both of these teams came out, it was so silent in there. However, that was not the case when the match ended and that’s mainly for one reason, Juice Robinson. He was constantly saying something in a loud manner, but it actually made you pay attention to what was happening. Juice directing Captain New Japan on the Double Suplex just made me laugh for some reason. Juice yells at CNJ to “Come on man” and CNJ says “ok,” maybe because it was just so unexpected. Juice also just kept encouraging CNJ when he was in the ring and of course he livened up the crowd when he got the hot tag and went wild for a bit. G.O.D. is still rather uninspiring aside from their nice double team moves, but they do pick-up the win and look strong. They do have a post-match beat down afterwards, but Makabe and Honma run into the ring to break it up. This was a match that certainly got better as it went along. **
Match 4: (IWGP Jr. Champion) KUSHIDA & (NEVER Openweight Champion) Katsuyori Shibata vs. Jushin Thunder Liger & Yuji Nagata
Winners: Liger & Nagata (After Liger pins KUSHIDA with a Backslide)
Well, if you aren’t pumped for these two title bouts after this match, you don’t have a soul. The crowd was hot from the start by chanting for each wrestler at one point. Basically, this entire tag match, except for in a few instances, was either Nagata and Shibata or KUSHIDA and Liger. So, you got a very nice preview of both matches, which perhaps bordered on giving too much away. Nagata and Shibata beat the crap out of each other. They would run at each other with Big Boots, stiff elbows, Shibata chopped Nagata very hard in the head at one point. So, later in the match, right at the moment when Shibata was least expecting it, Nagata nailed him HARD with an elbow in the face. You could hear the thud and Shibata clutched his face for a good bit after that too. KUSHIDA and Liger both worked on an arm, which gave us the neat visual of both men clutching an arm trying to get at the other one. There was submissions galore in this as well, which gave it a much different feel than the other matches we’d seen up until this point. This was a very good match, which completely accomplished its goal, and gave Liger a win that shows he still has it. Liger has proven many times before that he can bring it when it comes to the big matches and if we get anything like this, it will certainly be a delightful contest. Nagata and Shibata looks like it will be great for totally different reasons than Liger and KUSHIDA, and that’s just fine. Those two even battled after the match as well. *** and ¾ *
Match 5: NEVER Openweight Six Man Tag Team Championship Match: (Champion) Hiroshi Tanahashi, Yoshitatsu, & Michael Elgin vs. Yujiro Takahashi, Bad Luck Fale, & (IWGP Intercontinental Champion) Kenny Omega (Bullet Club)
Winners AND STILL Champions: Tana, Yoshitatsu, & Elgin (After an Elgin Bomb on Yujiro)
Lord, Yujiro is bad. I just had to get that out of the way. Yoshitatsu is now the Bullet Club Hunter, uses the Pedigree for a finisher, and spits water as his entrance, a la Triple H. Although, aside from a few things like the Reverse Figure 4 and the Side Russian Leg Sweep, everything else is his normal offense. Honestly, I think he should use a bunch more Triple H moves. The crowd did cheer and chant his name during the match and he showed a lot more here than he did at Invasion Attack. Hopefully he grows into the gimmick and it doesn’t just become a thing that he’s doing. The crowd was also super into Michael Elgin and he was his usual great self. There were some nice interactions between Elgin and Omega, which included some downright NASTY elbows from Elgin and the Aerosol Spray spot, which has become a custom in Omega matches as of late. Omega even brought with him a trash can with a mop and broom, which he did use the mop to clean Tanahashi at one point. I do wonder if some of the goofy stuff will hurt him the further he goes up the card. I love Kenny Omega, but New Japan isn’t DDT, if the crowd and the Japanese viewers can’t take you seriously as a main eventer, that will become an issue. Right now though, he’s doing well so it seems to be ok. The match did have a nice near fall at the end with Yujiro pulling a Yano and doing the low blow/cradle combination, which the crowd popped for pretty big. Elgin gets the win for this team and keeps looking strong. This match was fun, but Fale and Yujiro aren’t in sync with Omega like the Young Bucks are, so this wasn’t as good as the Invasion Attack match. ***
Match 6: MAIN EVENT: 8-Man Elimination Tag Team Match: Team CHAOS: YOSHI-HASHI, Tomohiro Ishii, Hirooki Goto, & Kazuchika Okada vs. Team Los Ingobernables de Japon: BUSHI, EVIL, Sanada, & (IWGP Heavyweight Champion) Tetsuya Naito
Winners: Los Ingobernables de Japon (After Sanada makes YOSHI-HASHI TAP OUT to the Dragon Sleeper
Seeing Naito come out and just all the different types of fans that were happy to see him, certainly shows he is over with the audience. He fist bumped with some kids, some men were beside themselves trying to reach over to touch him, and women were cheering him as well. If the trajectory keeps going in an upward direction, the sky’s the limit for Naito honestly. New Japan adds over the top rope as an elimination route, so that you don’t have the Survivor Series scenario where a bunch of guys are taking falls, especially in a place like NJPW where taking a fall means something. The crowd was once again pro Los Ingobernables, as EVIL and Naito were cheered by the crowd. Sanada is still new, but he’s so crisp in the ring that you know he will get over in time. He just needs to work on making himself stand out and not appear like just a Naito lackey. Ishii and Naito had some good interactions, the crowd was electric to see Okada take down Sanada, but perhaps the winning pairing goes to Goto and EVIL. The times these two were going at it, it just felt like they were just on point and wanting to destroy each other at every turn. The match kind of lulled for a long while, as it took quite a bit for the first elimination to occur. The match streamlined after that, as Naito stepped off the apron and eliminated himself, EVIL took advantage of Ishii already being on the apron and knocked him off. Goto then whooped EVIL around the ring and just deposited outside like he was nothing, BUSHI misted Goto when he was on the apron and Sanada eliminated Okada.
YOSHI-HASHI was left outnumbered, but he was able to make BUSHI TAP OUT and then it was 1 on 1. Sanada and YOSHI had a series of terrific near falls and even though Sanada would eventually make YOSHI-HASHI tap, he looked strong against Sanada and once again continues to have a fantastic year. He still has a charisma issue, which probably prevents him from getting that big push, but Nakamura wasn’t wrong when he said that YOSHI-HASHI deserved to be given a chance. Sanada looked good, we know he can work and didn’t look out of place with New Japan’s top roster members. After the match, Los Ingobernables stood tall with Okada face down in the ring as Naito cut his promo and all four members stood over him. Talk about one hell of a visual. The match itself picked up after the first elimination to turn into a very good main event overall. I’d still say the standout thing to watch from this show is the Special tag match before intermission. *** and ¼ *
OVERALL RATING: 7.0 this wasn’t a special show by any means, it was kind of just ok for the first three matches and then the latter half kicked things into a much higher gear. They were able to promote all of the matches that are taking place on 4/27 or 5/3, especially the Jr. Title and NEVER Openweight Title matches in that splendid tag match. Korakuen was given a nice outing here by New Japan and it will be interesting if the next show can at least follow this one’s lead. For sure check out the KUSHIDA & Shibata vs. Nagata & Liger tag match if you don’t see anything else from this show, I can guarantee you will have a whole new perspective on those two matches afterwards.
