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From Hiroshima, Japan
1 - Boltin Oleg and Toru Yano vs. Rey Paloma and HANZO
Paloma and HANZO are the Frontier Zone wrestling promotion. Both men look like Junior Heavyweights.
Oleg pins Paloma after a Kamikaze slam.
2 - Tiger Mask, YOSHI-HASHI and Hirooki Goto vs. Taiji Ishimori, Chase Owens and KENTA
Owens hits Tiger Mask in the face with the Tag Title belt.
Owens pins Tiger Mask.
Bullet Club beats down Goto and YOSHI-HASHI after the match.
3 - Kosei Fujita and Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Francesco Akira and Jeff Cobb
Cobb hits a power bomb on Fujita followed by a driving lariat. Cobb pins Fujita after a Your of the Islands.
4 - El Desperado, Shota Umino and Tomohiro Ishii vs. Yujiro Takahashi, Ren Narita and EVIL
Umino pins Yujiro after a Death Rider.
Ren Narita immediately hits Umino with the push up bar after the pin.
The announcers hype Narita facing Jon Moxley at Wrestling Dontaku for the IWGP World Championship, and Umino facing the winner at Resurgence on May 11.
5 - Tomoaki Honma and Katsuya Murashima vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi and Shoma Kato
Tanahashi forces Kato to submit to a Texas Cloverhold.
6 - TAKA Michinoku and DOUKI vs. Yoshinobu Kanemaru and SHO
DOUKI and SHO have a storyline where SHO will only fight in a non-title match. DOUKI has already earned a title match and SHO refuses to sign a contract.
DOUKI wrapped SHO in a modified figure four and trapped his right arm in the hold. Awesome submission. SHO tapped out, but TAKA gets the mic and tells SHO sign the contract for a Title Match. SHO signs the contract with his left hand.
DOUKI wins and gets his Title Match.
7 - STRONG Openweight Tag Championship: El Phantasmo and HIkuleo vs. Shane Haste and Mikey Nichols
Solid match. ELP hits a Super Thunderkiss 86 on Nichols. Hikuleo goes for the pin but Haste breaks the count. Haste hits a lariat on ELP. Hikuleo hits a powerslam on Haste and goes for
Godsend. Nichols grabs Hikuleo in a school boy roll up and pins Hikuleo.
TMDK retain the STRONG Openweight Tag Championship.
Hikuleo was pissed after match and started shoving Nichols. Both teams were separated.
8 - KOPW 22024 Provisional Championship: Great O-Khan vs. Yuya Uemura
Weird match. The first stipulation was a tire stacking competition. Whoever stacked 4 tires around a traffic cone wins. Uemura stacks the 4 tires first.
Second stipulation is a lemon eating contest. They have to eat the entire lemon, skin and all.
Uemura struggled to eat the lemon. O-Khan bit the lemon and chewed it all in a few minutes. O-Khan won this stipulation.
Third stipulation was a No-DQ Table Match. This went into the crowd and they teased many bumps through tables on the floor.
Uemura hit a Deadbolt Suplex which sent O-Khan across the ring into a table.
Uemura wins the match and is the new KOPW Champion. Taichi and TAKA celebrate the win.
O-Khan was still selling the table bump after the match. He is a Pro and does a lot to put over the younger stars.
The stipulations were silly but it got Uemura over.
9 - Elimination Match: Los Ingobernales de Japon vs. Bullet Club War Dogs
Jake Lee comes to the ring first. The rest of the War Dogs come to the ring.
LIJ come to the ring with a Japanese baseball mascot. The crowd was hot for this match. LIJ is way over. Lee went after Naito and all spilled into the crowd. Wild match.
Takagi hit a Pumping Bomber that sent Kidd and himself over the top rope.
Takagi and Kidd are eliminated.
BUSHI tosses Moloney over the top rope.
Moloney is eliminated.
BUSHI pins Conners with a BUSHI Roll.
Finlay picks up BUSHI in a powerbomb and tosses him over the top rope. BUSHI is eliminated.
Finlay knocks Tsuji off the top rope to the ring apron. Lee grabs his legs. Finlay hits an elbow and knocks Tsuji to the floor.
Yota Tsuji is eliminated.
Hiromu eliminates Finlay over the top rope.
Lee eliminates Hiromu with his Face Break Shot.
Lee faces off against Naito. Lee goes for a chokeslam but Naito hits a Tornado DDT. Naito hammers him with elbows. Lee kicks Naito off the top rope. Lee misses a Face Break Shot. Naito drags him over the top rope, leg sweeps him and a dropkick to the head.
Lee is eliminated.
Naito and LIJ wins the elimination match.
Naito recites the Roll Call to make the crowd happy.
Jake Lee is an impressive wrestler. He is immediately put on the level of Naito. I would argue he is even a bigger talent (draw) than everyone in War Dogs. I see Jake Lee as a temporary opponent while the World Title is not in Japan.
Viewpoint of the IWGP World Title Picture:
The IWGP World Heavyweight Champion will have a two match tour on May 3 and May 4 at Wrestling Dontaku 2024. Jon Moxley will more than likely defeat Narita on May 4 and move on to face Shota Umino on May 11 at Resurgence in California. Umino and Moxley's relationship goes back several years so their story makes sense.
I am still confused why New Japan chose to switch the title to Moxley when Naito was still a popular champion. Naito had beaten SANADA twice and Yota Tsuji in 2024. Naito gets massive pops from the Japanese fans. President Hiroshi Tanahashi has spoken of his desire to have sell out crowds in Japan. So why take the belt off your top guy in the company? Why put the World Title on a wrestler who is in another company on a different continent?
Conveniently, the Best of the Super Junior 2024 is coming soon so the focus is off of the Heavyweight division for about a month.
I have no sources, only an educated guess, but I believe that Tony Khan paid a lot of money to New Japan for Jon Moxley to be the IWGP champion. Wrestlemania is done and the WWE machine is still going strong. Khan is losing ratings, viewers and ticket sales. With Moxley, Tony Khan is telling the world that AEW is equal to or better than New Japan, a company that has been around for 51 years, much longer than AEW.
For the Japanese market, Moxley as Champion does nothing for build ratings or sell tickets in Japan because he will not be working the tours, just big events.
Moxley as character has popped in and out of New Japan over the past few years. He is an attraction, at best, to pop the Japanese audience, but he is not a Top Level star in Japan, like Okada, Tanahashi or Naito. I think Shota Umino is more over in Japan than Moxley because New Japan has booked him well, as always falling short of the big win and crowds want to see Umino win. If Umino beats Moxley for the IWGP Title on May 11, it will be a mixed bag. Umino will have won the top Title in NJPW, however, Umino will not have beaten the top Japanese star, which would be Tetsuya Naito. Moxley's track record shows he will do the job for people he likes, and will probably would put over Umino as his former protégé. Umino will also be hurt by winning the title in California on May 11 and not on his native soil in front of his own fans. The Japanese fans may feel cheated.
If Moxley beats both Narita and Umino, this will make New Japan look weak in comparison. Two top Japanese stars defeated by a New Japan part-timer paid by a billionaire. Tony Khan can brag that he has the top wrestler in the world in Moxley.
I have confidence that New Japan will book a way out of this situation, in a way that will be logical. The current state of IWGP World Title does not make any sense to me right now.
Thank you for reading.
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