CHIKARA versus Big Japan?! Keiji Mutoh holds the IWGP title and the Triple Crown?! NOAH is headlining their next big show with WHAT?! Yeah. Wall Street has nothing on this kind of chaos.
Section 1- Results
All Japan: Their show on September 28th saw Great Muta win the Triple Crown from Suwama, and Marufuji win the junior title from Hijikata. Akira Raijin returned on Saturday’s show and lasted 18 minutes against Suwama. Also on that show, Kea & Suzuki retained the tag titles over Tenzan & Kojima.
Dragon Gate: Doi & Yoshino won the tag titles from Saito & Yokosuka on September 26th. Shingo retained over Taka Michinoku on the 28th, and on the same show Mochizuki, Fujii & Magnitude won the trios titles. Cyber Kong & YAMATO took the tag straps from Doi & Yoshino on the 5th. Yokosuka won a 4-way elimination over Doi, Mochizuki and Gamma on the 10th to become the #1 contender. Yoshino won the lightweight title from Horiguchi on the Sunday.
New Japan: Today’s Sumo Hall even featured Mutoh downing Nakamura to retain the IWGP title, Nagata taking the Zero-One title from Masato Tanaka, Bernard over Hirooki Goto, Iizuka over Tenzan, Nakanishi & Yoshie over Chono & Tanahashi, and Yujiro & Naito winning the junior tag titles from Minoru & Devitt.
NOAH: On September 27th, Sasaki retained over Yone and Kanemaru & Suzuki retained over Yujiro & Naito. That card was at Osaka Prefectural Gym, a mid-sized venue, and it wasn’t even a half-house. Earlier today, KENTA defeated Danielson to win the junior title.
Section 2- News
All Japan: Their November 3rd Sumo Hall event will be headlined by Muta vs Suzuki for the Triple Crown. Also, Kondo will get a junior title shot.
Dragon Gate: CIMA returns on December 28th. K-ness vs Dragon Kid on the 26th will determine Yoshino’s next challenger, that match to occur on November 16th. Also on the big 11/16 show in Osaka Prefectural Gym will be Mochizuki, Fujii & Magnitude versus Tozawa, Iwasa & Arai in a trios titles vs stable match. Main event is Shingo vs Yokosuka for the big belt.
NOAH: The Budokan Hall show on the 25th will be headlined by Saito & Bison Smith defending the tag titles against Akiyama & Rikio. Nothing says “16,000 seat venue main event†quite like that. Also, Marufuji will defend the All Japan junior title against KENTA. I expect that to become title vs title in order to make the match bigger.
Section 3- Adagio for Shills
My interview with Scott Norton.
Section 4- Normally the Quack interview is enough, but there’s other stuff to analyze
-Mutoh holds the gold: If I’m okay with Mutoh as IWGP champ, I guess I’m okay with Muta getting the Triple Crown. Granted that means a lot of title matches this year enjoyed by Kevin Wilson and not me, but it’s not the end of the world and it does add urgency to Mutoh’s defenses. The January 4th Dome show is bound to have both titles defended, meaning he’ll lose sometime before the end of the year. Moving the Triple Crown back to Minoru Suzuki would be a baffling move in my estimation but it’s looking likely at this point.
-AJ/NOAH junior titles: Very interesting situation. Marufuji gave Hijikata the rub of a long match, and he boosts that title’s value to its highest point… ever? Clearly the companies have a plan, even if it’s a short one that wraps up with the Kondo match. What upsets me is the way they tossed Danielson aside. His title win and sole defense were on ROH shows, and his loss comes on a mid-tour event at a venue that isn’t known for crowd heat. Danielson is the kind of wrestler NOAH needed to put the junior title on for a while, because he could elevate wrestlers like Kotaro Suzuki. Oh well.
-NOAH sees an iceberg and steers towards it: Shouldn’t a company that lost its top star try to, you know, go all-out on its big events? Saito & Smith vs Akiyama & Rikio would be a nice main event for Korakuen, and a nice semi-main at Budokan Hall if they had a BIG title match on top. Having that as the draw is a disaster in the making. Marufuji vs KENTA in a junior title vs title match is interesting, and I’m sure the NOAH faithful will have high expectations, but here they are two years after battling for the heavyweight title and it’s the semi-main and they’re firmly back in the junior ranks.
Meanwhile they have a bunch of marquee names in bland undercard tags. Misawa, Taue, Takayama and Sasaki aren’t getting any younger. Morishima doesn’t get anything from being in a tag opposite the likes of Superstar Steve. Has booking mastermind Akiyama lost his senses? It kinda looks like they’re moving towards Sasaki vs Misawa, and hey, that might sell out, but why not build to it with something like Sasaki & Takayama vs Misawa & Morishima? That sort of match isn’t really giving anything away since it’s unlikely to be repeated, and it would signal that they’re at least making SOME effort to fill the second-largest venue in Tokyo. It’s like they’re determined to go under the bar set by Rikio vs Saito in 2005, Akiyama vs Inoue in 2006, and the March 4th show last year. NOAH booking is like the stock market: you keep expecting it to hit bottom and bounce back, but it doesn’t.
Section 5- If it’s autumn, it’s time for Quackenbush
Last week while scanning the internet I happened upon the following:
Even more Big Japan in Chikara?
My curiosity piqued, I decided to send an email to Mr. Chikara himself, Mike Quackenbush. As usual his replies were prompt. The interview includes questions I solicited from others, including Johnathan Kirschner.
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Q: How far have you come in recovering from your head injury since last October?
A: I’ve come to the conclusion that I am as healed as I can be given the number of concussions I’ve incurred over the years. I will never be 100% again. But, maybe now I’m 95%, and that’s as good as it will get for me. There is no sense in pretending I’m going to be the same as I was before, and I feel that and deal with it every time I tape up my wrists.
Q: What led to the sprawling CHIKARA vs. Big Japan clash on the 18th & 19th?
A: Truth be told, when we put the word out that we were looking for another promotion to collaborate with us on the Global Gauntlet, BJW was one of the groups we thought would never respond. To our surprise, they were first. It’s been a difficult process, but BJW seems to have a real ax to grind with CZW, and in their minds, since CHIKARA is the direct competition for CZW, they want to deal with us and open up business relations. We don’t see ourselves as relating to CZW that way, but apparently, BJW does, and that sent them in our direction.
INTERLUDE: Here’s the backstory. In 2000, CZW was able to convince Big Japan that it was a big deal, and the companies exchanged talent. That CZW was able to get wins over Big Japan’s top names says all you need to know about the feud. There was a falling out in early 2002, with both sides blaming the other. Why Big Japan thinks this would hurt CZW, I have no idea.
Q: Are there any plans for a 2009 King of Trios that you can reveal? Other visitors from across the Pacific we’ll see over the coming months?
A: There is nothing set up for 2009 at this point, not even a season premiere. We are really deeply invested in our October and November events, and their success or failure will determine what, if anything, comes next.
Q: What was it like wrestling Marufuji in WXW?
A: Great fun. Neither of us were on our “A” game that day, but we did the best we could in light of the circumstances. For all the time he’s spent in AAA though, he really doesn’t understand lucha, which I discovered to my chagrin. When the match was over, I was pleased with it, but the frowns on the faces of the NOAH agents seemed to say that they did not feel similarly.
Q: How did your match with the legendary Johnny Saint come about? What was that like?
A: It took some serious campaigning to get the nod as his opponent.. There was a giant list of people that wanted the match with Saint, and I had to work my magic to make sure it was me. Truth is, back in 1999 when I started giving clinics/seminars at wrestling schools, I was the first American indy guy to start spreading the word about Saint to fellow workers, and a lot of the guys that people associate with that style first discovered him because of my work spreading the Saint gospel. There was no way I would let that match pass me by.
Q: How excited are you for the rematch with Saint?
A: I feel like a kid counting down the days to Christmas.
Q: How did the upcoming CHIKARA-in-Germany events come about?
A: We’ve come to discover that, for a variety of reasons, our biggest following in a non-English speaking country happens to be in Germany. My experience with fans in Europe has been nothing short of positive, and we have, in limited ways, exposed the German fans to the CHIKARA style in the past. It was an easy choice.
Q: How were you able to get Dragon Gate’s mcKZ for the final night of King of Trios?
A: That was entirely Dragon Gate’s doing. They were also intending to send Lupin Matsutani to represent the company, but he suffered a neck injury just before the tournament.
Q: How did you obtain Ibushi for the tag tournament?
A: That’s a question for Dave Coulier.
Q: Which CHIKARA graduates do you think have done the best job representing the spirit of the company?
A: That’s difficult to say. I know if we send a guy like Hallowicked on the road, or a more recent act like the Osirian Portal, that they will represent us correctly. There are definitely some guys that do not, and to that end, we always must be wary of the image we project.
Q: Are there any concerns with occasional hard-hitting matches potentially harming the kid-friendly ambiance?
A: We’ve heard some complaints over the years about certain matches that parents didn’t like in terms of being suitable for their kids. While I’d like to think we do a better job than most companies of respecting the wishes of our paying customers, we are not shackled by their demands or requests. By and large, though, parents know we offer up a PG-rated show, and when things go over the line, it’s usually a simple judgment error on the part of a performer rather than an intentional effort to upset the CHIKARA status quo. That being said, there are times when we relish being able to play with our audience’s expectations.
Q: Do you think CHIKARA has a chance to break out the way ROH did? ROH has obtained a lot of recognition, it’s on PPV, it now visits a dozen or more cities regularly, etc. However it started in an absolute dump in Philly. Do you see CHIKARA managing that sort of growth?
A: We too started in an absolute dump, at 1313 Linden Street in Allentown. So anything is possible. However, we don’t have the type of financial backing or stability that ROH does. We live and die on ticket and DVD sales. When the fans stop coming, or stop buying our DVD’s through Smart Mark Video, we fold. No one is going to concoct a “bail-out” plan for CHIKARA when that happens.
Q: How did the first few Pod-Per-Views do, and will there be more?
A: They were very time-consuming to create, and not profitable at all. I don’t anticipate a return to that project any time soon.
Q: Of the foreign wrestlers to visit CHIKARA, did any have surprisingly good English skills?
A: Nope.
Q: What’s in store for the NWA junior heavyweight title?
A: Hopefully a trip to New Japan. Are you listening, NWA Board of Directors?
Q: What shows/DVDs from the last year or so would you recommend to fans checking out CHIKARA for the first time?
A: Our Best of 2007 set is pretty comprehensive in terms of a starting point. This year’s best-selling events include “King of Trios 2008,” “Aniversarioct,” “Young Lions Cup VI, Night 3” and “Style and Substance.”
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Thanks once again to Mike. Those of you with the ability to get to the shows this weekend, by all means do so! Big Japan and Chikara are two loveable underdogs in the world of professional wrestling and need all the support they can get. Especially Chikara.
Next Time: Kobashi! I swear!
