Csonka Ranks The 2018 New Japan Cup Matches

Welcome back to column time with Larry! Today I’d like to talk about the 2018 New Japan Cup. The 2018 New Japan Cup was a really great tournament, with great matches and a plan to make Zack Sabre Jr a top star in the company. Today, I want to look at the matches and rank them from worst to first; think of this as a best of playlist so that you can weed out the matches not really worth the time. Thanks for reading, and remember, it’s wrestling, we love it and will disagree. The only rules are “have a take, be respectful, and don’t be a dick.” You can read reviews of night one here, night two here, night three here, night four here, night five here, night six here, night seven here, night eight here, and the finals here. You can also read my overall takeaways at this link.

– 15. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.12.18 – Toru Yano vs. Davey Boy Smith Jr. [*½]
– 14. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.15.18 – SANADA vs. Toru Yano [**½]
– 13. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.10.18 – Lance Archer vs. Bad Luck Fale [**¾]

12. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.09.18 – SANADA vs. Chuckie T [***¼]: This was an overall good main event, and while the winner was never really in doubt, Chuckie put in a really good effort and almost made me believe he could win. SANADA winning felt like the right call going in, and a likely match with he and Zack looks like it could be a real good one.

11. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.09.18 – Michael Elgin vs. Juice Robinson [***½]: This was a very good back and forth match, with Elgin playing subtle heel in order to let Juice’s babyface abilities to shine through. Elgin looked for his big finish, but was a bit too overconfident, allowing Juice to score the cradle and advance. It’s another big win for Juice, and one that the crowd loved. He’s such a great babyface.

10. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.09.18 – Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Bad Luck Fale [***½]: This was another very good match, with Tanahashi again knowing how to work very well with Fale and getting the best out of him. I liked the countout victory here, it protects Fale, it reminds fans that it can happen at any time and most importantly, these fans went crazy for it because the hero beat the monster.

9. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.09.18 – Juice Robinson vs. Yujiro Takahashi [***¾]: This was a very, very good match here, easily the best thing on the show so far, and the best Yujiro match in forever. Yujiro was a great douchey heel, fighting with aggression to try and get his first NJ Cup win, but Juice overcame and was an amazing babyface here, constantly fighting with fire and overcoming. The evolution of Juice has been so much fun to follow, and the crowds love him.

8. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.18.18: Zack Sabre Jr. defeated SANADA [***¾]: While not at the level of some of Zack’s previous two tournament matches, this was a very good main event. They went long, but it didn’t feel long, and told a good story, with SANADA being able to keep up with Zack early on, and then Zack moving into counter wrestler mode, looking for that opening or mistake. The story around the TKO, the constant counters, and finally hitting it was great. But for me, the thing that held this back from being great was SANADA’s selling. LIJ are largely babyfaces by default, because the crowd loves them, and Zack has been the devious grapple-fucking heel through out the tournament. So while LIJ gets face reactions, and SANADA has great babyface fire, he’s not great selling babyface, and with so much of the match being built around him selling, it created a large disconnect for me. Zack Sabre Jr. continues to roll, and it has been a blast so far.

7. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.09.18: Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Taichi [****]: And with the win, Tanahashi gets out of the NJ Cup first round for the first time in four years. This was an absolutely great match, with Taichi stepping up once again and more than delivering in his part of the match. He’s having the best week of his career. Sure some will chalk it up to working with Naito and Tanahashi, but he’s really stepped up his game, and works way better as a heavyweight, but to my surprise and delight. Tanahashi’s match layouts are so good, he was very giving and had the crowd believing that Taichi was on his level and was about to beat him. This was a great match, with Taichi gaining a lot even though he lost again, and Tanahashi looking great coming off of his time off.

6. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.16.18: Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Juice Robinson [****]: This was a great main event, with Juice putting in an overall excellent babyface performance. That was made possible by Tanahashi’s willingness to play the subtle heel role. He’s so confident in his positioning that he knows he can do this, that it won’t hurt him, and it doesn’t hurt that he’s damn good at it. Juice had an extremely strong tournament, continuing his evolution as a performer, and loved babyface. Tanahashi winning made the most sense because he’s doubly motivated to win at all; either to stop Okada from breaking all of his records or to go for revenge against Suzuki.

5. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.09.18 – Tomohiro Ishii vs. Michael Elgin [****½]: This was an absolutely awesome main event, featuring two powerhouses kicking the shit out of each other for nearly 30-minutes. It was very basic back and forth for the first ¾ of the match, and smartly so as they kicked things up big time with an amazing closing stretch, and when they went into the bigger moves, the crowd treated everything like a big deal and were fully invested in what both guys were doing. I absolutely loved this, and they set the bar high on night one for the rest of the tournament.

4. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.11.18 – Kota Ibushi vs. YOSHI-HASHI [****½]: This was an excellent match, and as far as I can recall, HASHI’s best match and overall performance ever. HASHI has been a good performer, but also one that at times, just doesn’t click in big time matches. He’s never bad, but at times the crowd doesn’t care and he lacks that big match fire. But this was the HASHI I have been waiting for, he was great here, working with aggression and a sense of urgency that made him feel as if he belonged in there with Ibushi. Ibushi was an awesome babyface here, never giving up, and continuing to battle back no matter what. When Ibushi is locked, in, few are better. You add all of that together, and add in the hot homestretch, and completely invested crowd on the near falls, and you get an excellent match that more than exceeded expectations. Make sure not to skip this one.

3. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.11.18 – Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Kota Ibushi [****½]: In a shocking turn of events, these two guys are really good. They had a great G1 match, but completely topped it here. Sabre is on a hell of a run and is making his case for most outstanding performer of 2018 already, just delivering at an insane high quality so far this year. This match was excellent, with Zack controlling with his grappling and counter style offense, while Ibushi was an amazing babyface here, with a hot crowd almost begging for him to win. The atmosphere was amazing, Zack looks like a world-beater once again, dominating another top guy and feels primed to win the whole thing. The work from both was so clean, and crisp, coming across as effortless from both guys. Zack is easily the best technical wrestler in the world and is making his case for best in the world, and he’s doing it in the US, UK, and Japan against a wide variety of opponents and it’s only March. This is another must see match from the tournament.

2. From NJPW New Japan Cup 3.11.18 – Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Tetsuya Naito [****½]: This was another excellent match, but in a completely different style that HASHI vs. Ibushi. Naito is a great big match wrestler, and he was in main event mode tonight, while ZSJ is one of the very best in the world right now, already putting together a ton of excellent matches so far in 2018. Naito was an amazing babyface here, with great selling, excellent fight spots, and doing an amazing job of making the crowd root for him with every desperate fight; it was an excellent performance in that regard. Work looks so fluid, so smooth and almost effortless. He dominated a former IWGO champion here, with amazing submission work and transitions out of Naito’s signature offense. This is a huge win for ZSJ, and also serves as payback for his 2017 G1 loss to Naito in a match that was even better than their first. This is a must see match.

1. From NJPW New Japan Cup Finals: Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi [****¾]: This was an excellent MOTY level main event match. Tanahashi was able to take it to Zack more than anyone else in the tournament, and they worked an excellent layout, with the crowd into everything. But Zack is such a great counter wrestler, he simply outlasted Tanahashi, waited for him to make a mistake and then capitalized on that and picked up the win. They layout was so good, the pacing was excellent, and the closing stretch kicked all the asses. While Tanahashi gave Zack his toughest fight, in the end, he submitted the quickest, due to the way that Zack constantly broke him down, picking him apart until there was no fight left. This was really next level work from both guys, and a fitting end to a great tournament.

– End scene.

– Thanks for reading.

“Byyyyyyyyyyyyyye Felicia.”