NJPW Press Conference Recap
NJPW held a press conference this morning to confirm the four championship matches we had already anticipated coming out of this weekend’s Power Struggle show. They also announced details for this year’s World Tag League (below), and confirmed that the rematch between Evil and Katsuyori Shibata will take place at the upcoming Singapore show on 11/15.
Tetsuya Naito and Hiroshi Tanahashi were the two big stars interviewed at the press conference. Naito as the current IWGP Intercontinental Champion stated that Tanahashi was not the guy he wanted to wrestle at Tokyo Dome, but expected this to be his match as anything Tanahashi wants, he gets. He claimed that Tanahashi was no longer the heart and soul of New Japan after losing to Okada at Wrestle Kingdom 10, and that the void had been filled by him and Los Ingobernables de Japon, and that his opponent hadn’t accomplished anything in 2016.
Tanahashi admitted that much has changed in the landscape, and that even after all the times he beat Okada and headlined the Tokyo Dome, all it took was one loss for it all to come crashing down. Naito said that he knows Tanahashi needs him to get back into the main event at Wrestle Kingdom for a seventh year straight, and that is why he is rejecting the idea of a “fan vote” to determine the true main event, and wants the IWGP Heavyweight title match to go on last, thereby crushing Tanahashi’s goal. He said that he has no motivation for this match, other than to put the final knife in Tanahashi’s great career.
World Tag League Brackets Announced
The brackets and competitors have been announced for this year’s NJPW World Tag League, kicking off 11/18 at Korakuen Hall and ending 12/10. Like the G1 Climax, the World Tag League is a points-based tournament with two blocks, with eight teams in each block that will all face each other over the course of 16 shows, leading to a final event with the winners of each block going head-to-head.
Billy Gunn, of all people, will be heading to New Japan to wrestle in the tournament as Yoshitatsu’s tag team partner. Tatsu has been working a ill-received “Bullet Club Hunter” gimmick and recently kicked out his partner, the equally awful Captain New Japan, who has joined the Bullet Club as a character named Bone Soldier.
A Block
- Juice & Tanahashi
- Naito & ??? (LIJ)
- Brian Breaker & Leland Race
- Takahashi & Hangman Page (Bullet Club)
- War Machine
- Nakanishi & Henare
- Tenzan & Kojima
- Guerrillas of Destiny (Bullet Club)
B Block
- Okada & Yoshihashi
- Makabe & Honma
- Sanada & Evil (LIJ)
- Shibata & Nagata
- Omega & Chase Owens (Bullet Club)
- Bone Soldier & Fale (Bullet Club)
- Goto & Ishii
- Yoshitatsu & Billy Gunn
The World Tag League has been a yearly staple of New Japan programming dating all the way back to 1980 in one form or another. It has seen its fair share of odd pairings, and has been won by the likes of Antonio Inoki and Bob Backlund, Inoki and Hulk Hogan, Tatsuji Fujinami and Big Van Vader, Giant Bernard (Matt Bloom) and Tyson Tomko, and once by current WWE tag team Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows.
