NJPW Destruction in Kobe Review, 23/9/18

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The final show of the Destruction tour aired in Kobe on Sptember 23rd, headlined by a match between Hiroshi Tanahashi and Kazuchika Okada.  At stake was the Wrestle Kingdom 13 main event contract that Tanahashi won as G1 Climax winner.  The semi-main event saw BUSHI take on KUSHIDA in the first match of the tournament to crown a new Junior Heavyweight Champion.  Nearly 6,500 fans came to the Kobe World Hall to watch the show. 

Yota Tsuji vs. Yuya Uemura – Tsuji and Uemura have currently faced each other sixteen times, and each one has been a time limit draw.  This was another time limit draw, but both Tsuji and Uemura are looking increasingly impressive with each match.  Uemura got a very close near-fall with a jacknife cover, but as the time expired Tsuji had Uemura trapped in a Boston Crab.  The first time one of these two wins a match is going to be really special.

Winner: Time Limit Draw, 10:00

Roppongi 3K (SHO and YOH) vs. Shota Umino and Ren Narita – Roppongi 3K took on the two most senior Young Lions in this tag match, and despite the fact that SHO and YOH got the victory they made Umino and Narita look really good.  The junior tag division has been a bit of a mess this year, but this win gave Roppongi 3K some momentum going into the upcoming Junior Tag League.  Narita got a very close fall with a small package pin on YOH, which was one of YOH’s trademarks during Best of the Super Juniors this year, but finally YOH hit a falcon arrow to pick up a win.  I wouldn’t be opposed to having Umino and Narita in the Junior Tag League this year, they make a good team.

Winners: Roppongi 3K, 8:46

Tiger Mask and Jyushin Thunder Liger vs. Yoshinobu Kanemaru and El Desperado – The booking of the Junior Tag Team Titles this year has left a lot to be desired, and with the G1 Climax dominating the summer calendar there hasn’t been a title defence since Dominion.  This was another good tag team match, which ended with a surprising win for Tiger Mask and Liger, who managed to overcome Suzuki-gun’s cheating to presumably book a title shot in the near future.  Kanemaru hit a beautiful moonsault on Tiger Mask for a two count, and was setting him up for a Deep Impact, but Tiger countered and picked up a win with a crucifix pin.  Both teams looked good in the leadup to the Junior Tag League next month.

Winners: Tiger Mask and Jyushin Thunder Liger, 6:50

Ryusuke Taguchi, Great Bash Heel (Togi Makabe and Tomoaki Honma), and Ayato Yoshida vs. TenCozy (Satoshi Kojima and Hiroyoshi Tenzan), Manabu Nakanishi, and Yuji Nagata – Ayato Yoshida’s tour continued with a match involving the New Japan Dads plus Taguchi.  This match was fairly average, but it was a chance to get people on the card, and the crowd popped for all the veterans’ signature moves.  Kojima has looked great since he came back from injury, and it was a shame that he had to miss the G1 this year.  Out of all of the New Japan Dads, he’s the one that I’m most excited about right now – he looks like he can still put on some quality matches.  Yoshida took another pin in this match from a Nagata back drop, to round off his Destruction tour.  He’s looked good in defeat and presumably his stock is high with the company given the matches that he’s been put into so far.

Winners: TenCozy, Yuji Nagata, and Manabu Nakanishi, 9:56

Best Friends (Chuckie T and Beretta) vs. Killer Elite Squad (Lance Archer and Davey Boy Smith Jr.) – This was a rematch from Destruction in Beppu – when KES beat Best Friends with the Killer Bomb – and it gave Best Friends a chance to avenge their previous loss.  Best Friends again used their speed to overcome KES’ power advantage, although Beretta demonstrated his toughness by surviving an onslaught from both Archer and Smith, including a Killer Bomb that he reversed into a flash crucifix pin for the victory.  The two matches involving these teams were good fun, and a solid warm up for the World Tag League.

Winners: Best Friends, 12:41

Toa Henare, David Finlay, and Juice Robinson vs. Will Ospreay, YOSHI-HASHI, and Jay White – YOSHI-HASHI has been the subject of a bit of a tug of war between Okada, White, and Tanahashi in the lead-up to the main event of this show, and this match continued to further some of the tensions simmering within CHAOS.  This was a fun match, which allowed everyone to show off their stuff – Henare looked particularly good – and White continued his shit-housery.  This culminated in YOSHI-HASHI holding Henare up for White to hit, but Henare ducked and White predictably hit YOSHI-HASHI in the face.  Henare nearly caught White with a roll-up, but a quick Blade Runner led to a three count and a CHAOS victory.  After the match YOSHI-HASHI and White remonstrated in the ring, before Ospreay and YOSHI-HASHI left looking exasperated.

Winners: Will Ospreay, YOSHI-HASHI, and Jay White, 9:05

Minoru Suzuki, TAKA Michinoku, and Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Tetsuya Naito, EVIL, and SANADA – At Destruction in Beppu Naito got a victory over Suzuki, while ZSJ won the tag team match with a roll-up pin on EVIL.  EVIL swore revenge on Sabre, and gained a measure of it in this match when he pinned TAKA after an STO.  The majority of this match was decent, but given that Naito already beat Suzuki this match felt like filler before they transition Naito into a new feud.  The best part of the match was when EVIL and ZSJ were in the ring together – that’s a match that I would like to see in the future.  Finally, TAKA ended up in the ring with EVIL, and fairly inevitably he fell prey to an STO and LIJ picked up the win.  I’m ready for Naito to move on from Suzuki-gun now.

Winners: Tetsuya Naito, EVIL, and SANADA, 11:20

Junior Heavyweight Championship Tournament

KUSHIDA vs. BUSHI – Thanks to the injury sustained by Hiromu Takahashi at Dominion he was forced to relinquish the Junior Heavyweight Title, and a four-person tournament was put together to determine the next champion.  Going into the match NJPW put a poll online to ask who the fans wanted to see win the title, and BUSHI won by a landslide.  The Kobe crowd was also behind BUSHI, although KUSHIDA was able to silence the crowd quite effectively with an early onslaught.  I have been down on BUSHI previously, and I thought quite a few of his Best of the Super Juniors matches were formulaic, but he was very motivated in this match and when he managed to avoid Back to the Future he seemed to have the upper hand.  This was an interesting juniors match since it didn’t involve much of the usual high flying that you would expect, but the grappling from both men was excellent.  BUSHI attempted to hit an MX but KUSHIDA managed to counter it into a Hoverboard Lock, which nearly forced BUSHI to tap out.  BUSHI was able to escape by spitting mist into KUSHIDA’s face and a backslide pin came very close to a three count.  Despite being blinded by the mist KUSHIDA caught BUSHI in mid-air and hit successive Back to the Futures for the victory.  Next up, the winner of Will Ospreay vs. Marty Scurll at Fighting Spirit Unleashed.

Winner: KUSHIDA, 16:41 

IWGP Heavyweight Championship Match Contract

Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Kazuchika Okada – Before the match started there was an excellent video package summarising Tanahashi and Okada’s respective years, and highlighting the history between the two.  The Kobe crowd was heavily behind Tanahashi as the two men faced each other in the ring before the bell.  Tanahashi’s record against Okada since he returned from excursion was three wins, five losses, and three draws, with the most recent of those draws coming in this year’s G1.  The match started off slowly, with both men not wanting to give up an early advantage, although this changed after Tanahashi injured his knee doing a dive to the outside.  In many of his matches Tanahashi targeted the knee of his opponent, but this time Okada was able to capitalise on his mistake, which drew the anger of the crowd.  After surviving an attack on his knee, Tanahashi turned the tables with a chop block and took the attack to Okada’s knee.  Despite that, Tanahashi clearly struggled with his knee more than Okada.

Tanahashi plays the injured underdog better than anyone in New Japan right now, and that was on full show in this match as Okada unleashed his heelish side on the Ace.  That didn’t stop Tanahashi from pulling off some daredevil moves, including a High Fly Flow to the outside after he had hit Okada with a Tombstone on the arena floor.  In a call back to their G1 match Tanahashi hit a High Fly Flow on a prone Okada just before the thirty minute mark and got a very close two count.  When he tried for a second High Fly Flow Okada was back on his feet and managed to counter with a dropkick.  Tanahashi managed to counter or dodge all of Okada’s attempts at a Rainmaker, until finally Okada was able to connect with a rolling Rainmaker.  Tanahashi reversed a full Rainmaker into a dragon suplex, and was able to finally put down his old foe after hitting three High Fly Flows to end the match with a decisive victory.

As Tanahashi celebrated after the match Jay White ran into the ring and hit him with a Blade Runner.  He then turned his attentions towards Okada and started beating him up, along with the Young Lions that tried to stop him.  YOSHI-HASHI came to the ring to try and stop him, but White attacked him with a chair, then Gedo ran down to the ring and grabbed the chair from White’s hands.  Okada got to his feet and stared down White, when suddenly Gedo hit Okada from behind with a chair.  A final Blade Runner on Okada left White and Gedo standing tall in the ring.  Gedo closed the show by cutting a promo hyping up Jay White and telling everyone to “breathe with the Switchblade”.

Winner: Hiroshi Tanahashi, 35:43

Final Thoughts

This was definitely the best of the Destruction shows – the main event was a great match, not even taking the storyline progression into account, as was the Junior Heavyweight match and much of the undercard.  New Japan makes a lot of its money from ticket sales so having a longer tour makes sense, but three Destruction shows felt like they had to drag out the good matches, and the quality of the first two shows was pretty average.  Cutting down to two shows would have helped I think, especially since the undercard got pretty repetitive after three shows.

Turning to the events of Kobe, the biggest news coming out of this show was Tanahashi defeating Okada decisively only to see Jay White seize the moment to try and take control of CHAOS.  Since Jay beat him in the G1 he will be Tanahashi’s opponent at King of Pro Wrestling next month, and while I doubt that he will beat Tanahashi he should still prove a tough adversary, particularly with Gedo in his corner.  The turn on Okada was hinted at throughout the G1 but going forward it will be interesting to see how things shake out.  Will other members of CHAOS follow Switchblade and Gedo, or remain loyal to the Rainmaker?  I could see this leading to a match between Okada and White at Wrestle Kingdom 13, potentially involving other CHAOS members as well.

The result of the Junior Heavyweight match was somewhat of a surprise to me, since I thought that BUSHI would win as a tribute to the injured Hiromu.  Obviously that’s not going to happen now, and I have a suspicion that the final will end up being KUSHIDA vs. Marty Scurll, since KUSHIDA vs. Ospreay has happened a lot in the past.  Either way it should be a top match.  It is another interesting booking decision from NJPW, who continue to overlook Los Ingobernables de Japon for the top titles, despite the apparent fan support (admittedly Hiromu was LIJ, but the booking of Naito this year raises a lot of questions).

The full card for Fighting Spirit Unleashed was released yesterday, and on top of the US Title match between Juice Robinson and Cody, the Tag Title match between GOD and The Young Bucks, and the Ospreay vs. Scurll match, there are a number of matches to look forward to.  Okada and Ishii take on the Golden Lovers in the main event, in a match that some people have suggested could see Ishii turning on Okada (I’m not so sure).  KUSHIDA and Tanahashi take on the new team of Gedo and Jay White, while So Cal Uncensored, recent BOLA winner Jeff Cobb, Flip Gordon, and ACH make their returns.  Although the card is more heavily ROH than I would like, there are enough good matchups, and the likelihood of more CHAOS fallout, to keep me interested.

 

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