Kevin’s NJPW King of Pro Wrestling Review

NJPW King of Pro Wrestling
October 8th, 2018 | Ryogoku Kokugikan Sumo Hall in Tokyo, Japan | Attendance: 9,152

Other than Wrestle Kingdom, Dominion, and probably the G1 Climax Finals, King of Pro Wrestling is traditionally among the bigger shows of the year for NJPW. This year’s card feels a bit more thrown together and lesser on paper. Last year’s wasn’t great either, but this is the show that gave us Tanahashi/Suzuki in 2012 (*****), Tanahashi/Okada in 2013 (*****), Okada/Marufuji in 2016 (****¼), and a handful of great matches in the past. Let’s see if this year’s edition can surprise me.

IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Tag Team Championship: El Desperado and Yoshinobu Kanemaru [c] vs. Jushin Thunder Liger and Tiger Mask IV
The champs attacked during the entrance of the Junior Dads. Those dastardly bastards interrupted Liger’s GOAT theme. Once the match began, Tiger Mask took the heat segment and Liger’s hot tag worked well. He’s the best, isn’t he? The Dads brought their working boots, as did Desperado. Kanemaru, as always, was kind of just there. The Dads came close but never truly felt like a threat. Suzuki-Gun resorted to various forms of cheating, including using a whiskey bottle, before Desperado hit Pinche Loco to retain at 9:51. I knew you were a coward, Gedo. Let the Dads save this division. Anyway, the match was average. Decent action but typical Suzuki-Gun BS. [**¾]

Juice Robinson and Toa Henare vs. Tomoaki Honma and Togi Makabe
Great Bash Heel feel like kind of a lock to win another World Tag League. This may be the WTL unit for Juice, though I prefer him with David Finlay. Commentary noted how Juice’s heart might not be in this. He had a rough G1 and dropped his United States Title. Henare handled most of the work throughout this one. Juice came in relatively hot, but Makabe stopped him in his tracks. Henare continued to go after tough guys with no fear and it backfired as Makabe wrecked him with a lariat. Honma hit Kokeshi and Makabe finished with the King Kong Knee Drop at 10:20. An inoffensive tag to warm up for WTL. [**¼]

Bad Luck Fale, The Guerrillas of Destiny and Taiji Ishimori vs. Chase Owens, Hangman Page, and The Young Bucks
The Guerrillas and Taiji are NEVER Six Man Champions, while the Guerrillas also hold the Tag Titles. Neither title means much. Also, remember when Ishimori was going to be a great addition to the juniors division and now he hasn’t wrestled a singles match since June? Classic. Anyway, the Firing Squad came out to the OG Bullet Club theme. The good thing about having them all in one match means there aren’t any run-ins. Matt Jackson took the bulk of the heat, still selling the back injury from Wrestle Kingdom. That is dedication and part of what has made the Bucks a vastly improved team in 2018. I do wish they saved their heavyweight Tag Title win for WK. Have them fail a bunch because of their size difference and overcome it on the big stage. Alas, Gedo went a different route. The match came down to Owens and Loa. The latter countered a Package Piledriver and hit the Popup Gun stun to win at 12:06. Average pro wrestling at best. I haven’t’ been interested in the Bullet Club since 2014 and none of this is changing that. [**½]

Hirooki Goto, Tomohiro Ishii, and Will Ospreay vs. RevPro British Heavyweight Champion Minoru Suzuki, NEVER Openweight Champion Taichi, and Takashi Iizuka
Hey, this match has two interesting guys out of six. Thank you, Ishii and Suzuki. They did have a war in RevPro where Minoru took his title, and they have a rematch coming up. Goto lost the NEVER Openweight Title to Taichi. That title has fallen off a cliff since the days when Shibata held it. Most of the focus was on those two and when everyone else was involved, the match was kind of just there. Like, it happened and you almost immediately forgot what went down because it was so unmemorable. Things broke down late and Ospreay pinned Taichi after hitting Storm Breaker in 12:10. Mediocre match featuring uninteresting characters and Suzuki-Gun clichés. However, Minoru and Ishii were great together. Will seems to be moving to heavyweight, which sounds dreadful. [**]

The highlight came post-match, when Ishii reacted to Will getting the pin. You need to see it to appreciate it. But if they’re really booking Ospreay vs. Taichi for the NEVER Title, that sounds dire.

LIJ got a dope video package before the match, which is available on YouTube. Naito teased Milano Collection AT as the new LIJ member, but instead brought out “The Dragon” who was revealed to be Shingo Takagi. He recently departed Dragon Gate. Imagine thinking there’s a better, cooler stable out there than LIJ.

BUSHI, SANADA, Shingo, and Tetsuya Naito vs. Kazuchika Okada, Roppongi 3K, and Toru Yano
I first saw Shingo live at ROH Final Battle 2006 and have been a big fan since. However, I don’t believe his best move was to come to NJPW and join what is apparently the juniors division. That is a ROUGH division. This was the best match on the show so far. LIJ just get how to do proper multi-man tags. They all worked at a brisk pace and Shingo seemed to fit right in. Yano was his usual fun self and everyone had some strong exchanges. We got some Okada/Naito, invoking memories of their battle at Wrestle Kingdom earlier this year. Of course, it all came down to Shingo, who was here to make a statement. He put away SHO after a lariat and Last Falconry at 9:30. Simply put, this was a lot of fun. Looks like BUSHI and Shingo will enter the Super Jr. Tag Tournament. [***¼]

We’re supposed to get EVIL vs. Zack Sabre Jr. here. After their interactions in recent tags, this is a match I was truly looking forward to. Instead, EVIL came out on a throne carried by druids. One of them attacked him and revealed himself to be Chris Jericho. Jericho beat him down as Sabre played innocent. Jericho hit EVIL with the Codebreaker and this was ruled a no contest. Sabre was pissed as the decision and attacked the officials. A cool angle, but a disappointment as this had MOTN potential. Sabre ended by putting EVIL in a submission until Naito hit the ring to fight with him. They traded blows until Naito hit a tornado DDT that sent him packing.

IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Championship Tournament Finals: KUSHIDA vs. Marty Scurll
Marty has never beaten KUSHIDA. They had a handful of matches last year and one this year, all capping out around ***¾. A lot of the early stuff in this match was solid, but ultimately didn’t feel like it meant much. Like a lot of NJPW matches, it picked up down the stretch. They gave us some good teases and near falls. However, it never truly felt like Marty had a shot to win. Even with the Chicken Wing, you just never bought into KUSHIDA losing. On the flip side, I loved the way KUSHIDA sold his fingers. It’s not something you see in matches often. But with Marty snapping them, KUSHDIA couldn’t even hold on the Hoverboard Lock and struggled to get a good grip at several times. KUSHIDA eventually captured his sixth title after 18:33. A very good match, but one that didn’t sniff the highs that Hiromu had for the division earlier this year. I liked most of the exchanges, but it lacked some drama. [***½]

G1 Climax Briefcase: Hiroshi Tanahashi [c] vs. Jay White w/ Gedo
White beat Tanahashi in the G1 (***¾) to earn this shot. It was Tanahashi’s only loss in the tournament. White may not be the best wrestler in NJPW this year, but he’s certainly the best and most interesting character. This was similar to their Wrestle Kingdom match (which is underrated by most in my eyes) in terms of execution. This one exceeded in terms of drama and crowd reaction. The fans have grown to hate White, so they were way invested in this. Like a lot of Jay’s G1 matches, this got riddled with shenanigans and ref bumps and such. It led to Gedo interfering, only to get knocked out by Tanahashi. They built to some decent near falls down the stretch, only for Jay to use the chair. It helped him a ton in the G1. However, Tanahashi stunned him by pulling him into an inside cradle and winning at 20:40. It suffered from the same thing the last match did where you didn’t believe the heel could win, and was overbooked to a fault. [***]

Post-match, Jay White and Gedo beat on Tanahashi until Okada made the save. Okada was left alone with Gedo, but then Jado arrived. He wore an Okada shirt and tried reasoning with Okada. All interest in this angle was killed when the Bullet Club OGs showed up. They teased attacked Gedo and Jado and siding with Okada, only to hit Okada with a Gun Stun. White joined in on the beating as he, Gedo, and Jado joined the group. I’ve been over BC bullshit for a long time. Jay was exciting, fresh, and interesting, but this was not the way to go.

IWGP Heavyweight Championship: Kenny Omega [c] vs. IWGP United States Heavyweight Champion Cody vs. Kota Ibushi
Here’s an interesting match. Three-ways aren’t typical in NJPW and feels very Americanized. To be fair, that’s how NJPW has been for several years now, even if some don’t realize/care to admit it. This never really felt like what I want from a major title match. It seemed like something you’d catch as a special attraction on an indy event. They worked some humorous stuff early, used a few creative triple threat style spots, and gave us solid character work. It also followed the tropes of one man being taken out of the action at a time, which we’ve come to expect from this match type. Ibushi was the star here, and his rampage near the end was great. Omega was way over the top with some of his character stuff, so the usual for him. Again, he’s fantastic when he’s not trying too hard and there was too much of that here. In the end, he retained via One Winged Angel on Ibushi after 34:13. I thought this was a very good main event, but one that was too lighthearted at points and lacked any true drama. I never bought Cody or Kota as champion. [***¾]

Post-match, Tanahashi and Omega exchanged words ahead of their Tokyo Dome match. I’m excited for that as it’s fresh and hasn’t been done since 2016, which was the only time we saw it. That, White/Okada, and Jericho/Naito II (after Jericho beats EVIL at Power Struggle I think) sound like the top of the WK card.

6.5

The final score: review Average

The 411

From a story perspective, a lot happened. We got the Shingo debut, White joining the BC, Okada saving Tanahashi, Ospreay beating the NEVER Champion, and a Jericho appearance. However, it was mostly average in the ring outside of two matches that capped at very good. Nothing great and it dragged at aprts.