Section 1- Important Results
All Japan: Days four, five, six and the finals of the Champions Carnival are in the books. Day 4 featured Kea and Albert going to a double-countout, and Mutoh pinning Jamal. On Day 5 Buchanan versus Palumbo went to a thirty minute draw (I’m sure it was thrilling), Suwama got a big upset win over Mutoh, Kojima beat Albert by countout, and Jamal got the win of a lifetime over Kawada. Day 6 decided who advanced, as all five tournament matches on that show effected the semifinals. Jamal advanced by downing Suwama, Albert got himself DQed to drop out of contention, Palumbo beat Mutoh to keep the Shining one out, Kawada beat Buchanan in a match where the winner advanced, and Sasaki beat Kea in the same situation.
The final night began with a gigantic upset when Jamal got yet another ‘win of a lifetime’, pinning Kojima. Sasaki defeated Kawada in the other semifinal, leading to Sasaki winning the tournament by defeating Jamal in the final. On the undercard, Taka retained the junior title over Nakajima- already his fifth title defense since winning on January 10th!
New Japan: The openweight tournament opened up yesterday with some big upsets. Kendo Kashin, replacing Shinya Makabe, beat Nakamura with a ref bump and a cradle; Tanahashi beat Nagata by DQ after Nagata hit the ref; Yoshie pinned the apparently de-pushed Scott Norton. Other winners were Chono, Nakanishi, Kanemoto, Minoru Tanaka and Tenzan.
NOAH: Yone versus Morishima for the openweight title was changed to a chain death match, and went to a double-knockout. Another notable match was an 8-man, 46 minute long juniors match on Sunday done with the ‘captains fall’ rules (wrestlers are eliminated until one of the two team captains is beaten). The face team of KENTA/Marufuji/Marvin/Kotaro Suzuki downed the short (or no) haired heels of Sugiura/Kanemaru/SUWA/Hashi.
Zero-One: They ran an eventful show last Thursday. Ikuto Hidaka took the junior title from WWE-bound Super Crazy, while Sato and Ryouji Sai downed the reuniting Ohtani and Tanaka for the tag titles. Omori retained the AWA title yet again, this time over Justin McCully.
Section 2- Other news
Dragon Gate: PoS Hearts (Mori/Shisa/Hulk) will get a shot at the 6-man belts on 5/1.
New Japan: An apparent rift has formed in Chono’s stable, as Nagata seems to have stolen Nakanishi and Kashin in order to form his new Blue Justice stable. Hirooki Goto seems to be floating between groups, and it looks like if Kaz Fujita ever returns he’ll be in Blue Justice as well. Nagata, Kashin, Fujita and Nakanishi all had high-profile amateur careers. Also, an apparent match on the Tokyo Dome card will be a Battle of the Bulge when Yoshie takes on the hotter-than-ever Jamal. Definitely added to the card is a tag title defense with Nakamura and Tanahashi defending against Nakanishi and Kashin. Lastly, ticket sales have been rather slow so far.
Joshi: Two of the most important women’s promotions, All Japan Women and GAEA, both closed their doors over the last two weeks. Though joshi was once able to draw as well as men’s promotions on big cards, they’re now more likely to see hundreds rather than thousands in attendance. Hopefully consolidating the talent will help, but I doubt it; things are already cluttered with ’80s, ’90s and new wrestlers all trying to get the spotlight. Cards that would formerly have been ‘supercards’ now get no press attention and don’t sell out the industry standard of Korakuen Hall. So sad.
Next Week: NOAH’s Budokan show results, and the New Japan openweight tournament concludes
