NJPW King of Pro-Wrestling was a stacked card with five title matches and a heated feud coming to a head. The lights were bright once again at Ryogoku Sumo Hall, and the NJPW roster shone in front of an appreciative crowd.
Here are the highlights of the big show:
Konosuke Takeshita is now the new IWGP World Heavyweight champion after defeating Zack Sabre Jr. in the main event. It was their third singles encounter, which puts Takeshita ahead with two wins over Sabre’s one.
Takeshita is now one step closer to his goal of main eventing Wrestle Kingdom 20 at the Tokyo Dome on January 4 as the G1 Climax winner and World Heavyweight champion. However, a challenger has already stepped up to block his path.
The challenge is in the form of the returning Hirooki Goto, who stepped in the ring for the first time since June in a six-man tag team match earlier on the show. Takeshita accepted his challenge, but not before lamenting that the younger NJPW talent did not step up to him first.
Their match has not been scheduled yet at the time of writing this article.
Yota Tsuji is now a two-time IWGP Global Heavyweight champion after dethroning his rival Gabe Kidd. Tsuji successfully avenged his loss last June against him and won back the Global belt.
After the match, Kidd hugged Tsuji and raised his hand, which was followed by a huge surprise. All of the Bullet Club War Dogs stepped into the ring flanked by their leader, David Finlay, where they were met by Tsuji’s fellow members of the Unaffiliated faction.
Finlay reached out his hand to Tsuji, and the two shook hands, to which members of both groups followed suit. A rare show of respect between two units headed by NJPW’s new generation of stars. What could this mean moving forward?
Stardom’s Syuri is once again the IWGP Women’s champion after beating Sareee in the opening match of the show. She now has the slight edge in their singles match record with two wins, the first one going way back in 2011.
Both women showed out in a 15-minute battle, filled with stiff strikes and violent maneuvers. Syuri’s toughness paid off in the end, as she got her hands raised in victory.
Yuto-Ice and OSKAR are still the IWGP Tag Team champions after winning a hard-fought first defense against Shota Umino and Yuya Uemura. They are now the first champions to surpass their first defense after the six previous teams could not.
While Umino and Uemura have only been a tag team for a few weeks, they proved to be a tough test for the new champions. Their first meeting could be a preview of a healthy rivalry that can lead NJPW’s heavyweight tag division, which could heat up even more as soon as this year’s World Tag League next month.
The King of Darkness and leader of House of Torture is now a four-time NEVER Openweight champion after a win over Boltin Oleg. Oleg did not go down without a fight, as it took all the House of Torture members to help EVIL win the match.
EVIL beckoned the rest of H.o.T. to come to the ring and beat up the already down Oleg when the young lions ringside tried to stop them. After they got rid of them, another young lion in judo, gold medalist Aaron Wolf, took down Dick Togo and Yoshinobu Kanemaru with judo throws.
EVIL, who looked insulted by what Wolf did, confronted him, but the rookie did not budge, staring a hole through the new NEVER Openweight champion until they walked out of the ring.
ELP’s dream match against Hiroshi Tanahashi in his 20th career anniversary celebration ended in a time-limit draw. The match ended with the challenger refusing to tap out to ELP’s submission attempt.
While there was no winner, the two still showed respect to each other after the match.
Here are the full results of the show:
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