NJPW King of Pro Wrestling 2016 | Ryogoku Kokugikan Sumo Hall in Tokyo, Japan
The Chaos vs. Bullet Club feud has been done to death. Chaos vs. Los Ingobernables de Japon was miles better and more interesting, so of course, Gedo went away from it and back to the status quo. At the very least, this match has new members of each team in Adam Cole and Will Ospreay, but their match at Destruction in Hiroshima was rather lackluster. This will be a typical multi-man tag. Yujiro is the most expendable guy here, so i think he eats the pin.
Winners: Tomohiro Ishii, Will Ospreay and YOSHI-HASHI
More stuff from Chaos, with the addition of Jado (NOAH's booker). The other team is a strange one. Togi Makabe and Tomoaki Honma are a team, Ryusuke Taguchi is a lower card junior and Bobby Fish is usually part of reDRagon. He's making the transition to heavyweight. I think this will ultimately be more fun than the previous tag. Roppongi Vice and Toru Yano are usually enjoyable, while I really love Fish. I'm gonna go with Fish getting the pin for his guys.
Winners: Bobby Fish, Ryusuke Taguchi, Togi Makabe and Tomoaki Honma
At the G1 Climax finals, the most interesting thing to me was the NOAH vs. NJPW tag. This one has potential, but I don't see it reaching the awesome levels of the last one. The previous one had Katsuyori Shibata and he added a lot with his battles with Go Shiozaki and Katsuhiko Nakajima. TenKoji and Yuji Nagata are awesome, while Manabu Nakanishi has tried but is pretty immobile. I like most of the NOAH guys and I think they pull it out here. Give them another win before NJPW starts coming back in the coming months.
Winners: Team NOAH
Oh look, it's the Young Bucks. I couldn't care less. The team of David Finlay and Ricochet is actually an interesting one. They're two thirds of the NEVER Openweight Six Man Tag Team Champions and I like them much more than Matt Sydal and Ricochet, mainly because Finlay > Sydal in my eyes. Considering they already hold titles and Gedo's raging hard on for the Young Bucks, they're gonna retain.
Winners: The Young Bucks
Wow. This sounds incredibly bland. There's a dude I follow on Twitter who insists on saying that the Guerillas of Destiny are good. Tama Tonga is decent but Tonga Loa is fucking awful. Their tag matches have all been the pits. The Briscoes are better, though I haven't liked their matches with the Bucks or Yujiro and Hangman. Of course, the Bullet Club continue to dominate NJPW cards and remain completely boring. I hear the Briscoes aren't sticking around for the World Tag League and Gedo loves to change titles, so the Guerillas win them back.
Winners: The Guerillas of Destiny
It isn't the best match on the card, but it certainly could be the most fun. Why? Because of Los Ingobernables de Japon. They have EASILY been the best thing about NJPW all year long. It really isn't close. The babyface team is interesting. Hiroshi Tanahashi, Michael Elgin and KUSHIDA team up consistently, but Jay Lethal is new to the group. Especially considering his alliance with LIDJ back in February. He beat Tetsuya Naito at ROH's most recent PPV. Tanahashi has continued a slide into not doing much of note, but I get the sense that they're setting up Naito/Tanahashi for the Intercontinental Title at Wrestle Kingdom. LIDJ wins this one, Tanahashi's team wins another match at Power Struggle and issues the challenge.
Winners: Los Ingobernables de Japon
Not a single thing on this card comes even close to matching this one in terms of excitement level. Katsuyori Shibata consistently has tremendous matches and Kyle O'Reilly has all the makings of a star. He should have been the one to dethrone Jay Lethal for the ROH World Title. Anyway, he has moved from junior heavyweight to heavyweight and is out to avenge his partner's loss at Destruction in Tokyo. O'Reilly made Shibata tap out at Field of Honor in August. I heard that was good but not quite great. They could be saving their best for this bigger match. I fully expect O'Reilly to show the world just how damn good he is, but Shibata should retain.
Winner: Katsuyori Shibata
Why? Usually, the G1 Climax winner defends his Tokyo Dome title shot against the guys who beat him during the tournament. For example, Hiroshi Tanahashi faced Tetsuya Naito and Bad Luck Fale on the road to Wrestle Kingdom 10 last year. If Kenny Omega followed that trend, he would have to beat YOSHI-HASHI (which he did), Katsuyori Shibata and Michael Elgin. Instead of Shibata/Omega or Omega/Elgin (though I'm okay without this since we've seen it three times this year), Omega has to rematch the finals with Hirooki Goto. I never watched the finals because I didn't give a shit. Beating Goto does nothing since he's a perennial loser and Gedo has booked all credibility away from him. Gedo loves his gaijins and I'm sure his wet dream is Omega/Okada in the Dome, even if it sounds bad to me.
Winner: Kenny Omega
On the first night of the G1 Climax 26, Naomichi Marufuji went out and defeated Kazuchika Okada. He didn't just beat though. He kicked his ass. That's what made the match so good. It wasn't the same tired Okada formula (insignificant slow start, Okada rally, big time closing sequence). It was something different. Unfortunately, I feel like this won't be able to match that. I expect it to be more of the Okada formula since he'll be retaining. Okada is going to headline the Tokyo Dome again. That was set in stone pretty much back in 2012, but definitely after he beat Tanahashi at WK10 this year.
Winner: Kazuchika Okada
