#njsjcup

[gdwessel]

Super J-Cup 2020 - 12/12/2020

The 8th Stage of Super J-Cup was aired last night on both NJPWWorld and FITE TV. Eight juniorheavyweight wrestlers across several different companies competed in this tournament.

Super J-Cup 2020 - NJPW LA Dojo, 12/12/2020 (NJPWWorld, Fite TV)

Super J-Cup 2020 1st Round: Chris Bey [Impact] d. Clark Connors (Art of Finesse, 9:36) 

Super J-Cup 2020 1st Round: ACH [FREE] d. TJP [FREE] (Midnight Star, 9:52)

Super J-Cup 2020 1st Round: Blake Christian [GCW] d. Rey Horus [ROH] (Frog Splash, 12:00)

Super J-Cup 2020 1st Round: El Phantasmo [Bullet Club] d. Lio Rush [FREE] (Schoolboy, 15:16)

JR Kratos & Danny Limelight [Team Filthy] d. Rocky Romero [CHAOS] & Fred Rosser (Limelight > Romero, pinfall, 12:49)

Super J-Cup 2020 Semifinal: ACH [FREE] d. Chris Bey [Impact] (Midnight Star, 8:27)

Super J-Cup 2020 Semifinal: El Phantasmo [Bullet Club] d. Blake Christian [GCW] (Superkick, 7:24)

KENTA & Hikuleo [Bullet Club] d. Ren Narita & Kevin Knight (KENTA > Knight, Boston Crab, 10:02) 

Super J-Cup 2020 Final: El Phantasmo [Bullet Club] d. ACH [FREE] (CR2, 16:11) - El Phantasmo wins Super J-Cup 2020

El Phantasmo, winner of last year’s SJCup, is now a two-time winner, putting him in such heady company as Jushin Thunder Liger and Naomichi Marufuji. And if that doesn’t make you question the whole continuing Super J-Cup thing, I don’t know what else will, because hoo lordy. El Phantasmo, two-time Super J-Cup winner, isn’t exactly something worth praising. I didn’t watch the event (I chose to see AAA Triplemania instead) so I don’t know if he made any anti-autism slurs this time around. But fact of the matter is, ELP is barely serviceable as a wrestler, not really worthy of a Two-Time Super J-Cup Winner push. (And no, it has nothing to do with his not being Japanese; the very first winner of Super J-Cup was Chris Benoit ffs. And the less said about him the better.) 

After the debacle of 2016′s overhyped and underwhelming edition, the last one to take place in Japan, this and the previous edition just felt the least Super J-Cuppy Super J-Cups ever. 

Now, to bring some positivity into this, I do appreciate there were more Black wrestlers featured in this than at any other time, with one even making the Final. And that Impact and GCW were able to get entries, into the semi-finals at that, is worth commending. 

But even so, this feels less and less like a summit of juniorheavyweights, as Jushin Thunder Liger envisioned the tournament in 1994, and more an excuse for NJPW to prove their superiority. I did appreciate the rotating sponsors of SJCup in years past, where WAR, Michinoku Pro and Osaka Pro would host the event. Now it’s basically an NJPW invitational, and really, a New Japan of America invitational. And if NJoA is booking, that means Bullet Club is getting pushed.

In any event, this show was pre-taped; at which point, I don’t know, I would assume during the same swath of tapings NJPW Strong is in, given the appearance of Team Filthy in a previously unannounced match. The semi-main was changed, as Karl Fredericks was injured, but again, since this was pre-taped, who knows WHEN that injury actually took place. Another indie wrestler of color, Kevin Knight, was inserted into Fredericks’ place. Ren Narita, meanwhile, is shown in his first match since February. Why wasn’t he featured in the tournament, one has to wonder?

But there were plenty of other choices last night. Indeed, Chris Bey was challenging for Impact’s World Title against Rich Swann at Final Resolution, whilst Lio Rush was under a Marvel-sponsored mask as Arcano (a Spider-Man luchador) at Triplemania. Nothing here seems worth catching up on, although ACH and Lio Rush are always worth watching. Maybe we can get Lio Rush in an actual NJPW ring soon.

For now, allegedly, we will get an El Phantasmo v. Hiromu Takahashi match in the near future, possibly night 1 of WK15, to possibly lead into a title match at night 2 against Taiji Ishimori. In the meantime, no tour lineups, no further matches for WK15 announced. Knowing NJPW they’ll hold a presser when I’m in bed tonight, so perhaps tomorrow morning we’ll know more.

[gdwessel]

Power Struggle 2020 - 11/7/2020; Cards For BOSJ27 Revealed; NJPW Strong Episode 14 - 11/6/2020; Super J-Cup 12/12/2020 Card Announced: Ren Narita Returns

The last megacard of the NJPW calendar, Power Struggle, took place today, and you can see it now on NJPWWorld. A legitimate first happened on this show!

Power Struggle 2020 - 11/7/2020, Osaka EDION Arena (NJPWWorld)

Provisional KOPW2020 Championship No Corner Pads Match: Toru Yano [CHAOS] © d. Zack Sabre Jr. [SZKG] (Countout, 12:11) - Yano remains Provisional KOPW2020 Champion

NEVER Openweight Championship: Shingo Takagi [Los Ingobernables] d. Minoru Suzuki [SZKG] © (Last Of The Dragon, 18:56) - Suzuki fails his 1st defense - Takagi becomes the 31st champion

Kazuchika Okada [CHAOS] d. Great O-Khan [The Empire] (Referee Stoppage, 12:58)

IWGP US Heavyweight Challenge Rights: KENTA [Bullet Club] d. Hiroshi Tanahashi (Game Over, 19:57) - KENTA retains IWGP US Heavyweight Challenge Rights

WK15 IWGP Heavyweight/Intercontinental Challenge Rights: Jay White [Bullet Club] d. Kota Ibushi (Backslide, 18:47) - White wins the WK15 IWGP Hevayweight/Intercontinental Challenge Rights

IWGP Heavyweight & Intercontinental Championships: Tetsuya Naito [Los Ingobernables] ©© d. EVIL [Bullet Club] (Destino, 33:08) - Naito succeeds his 1st IWGP Heavyweight defense - Naito succeeds his 1st IWGP Intercontinental defense

For the first time ever since “the briefcase” was introduced to NJPW in 2012, the challenge rights for Wrestle Kingdom have changed hands, as Jay White cheated to win by putting his feet on the ropes without Red Shoes catching it. This puts the number of times the briefcase OR title have changed hands between G1 Climax and Wrestle Kingdom in this era at one a piece, as Hiroshi Tanahashi defeated AJ Styles for the IWGP Heavyweight title at King Of Pro Wrestling 2014, in the run-up to WK9. 

After the main event, Jay came to taunt and challenge Tetsuya Naito, before being run off by Kota Ibushi. So I am pretty sure this is not the end of that storyline. Naito v. Jay White, could sell out the Tokyo Dome (such as it will be in the COVID-19 era). Naito v. Ibushi, definitely would sell out the Dome. Fairly confident we will still get Naito v. Ibushi, one way or another. Stay tuned for that.

KENTA retained his own briefcase, so the elephant in the room of when KENTA will actually face Jon Moxley is still pretty much right there, not being answered. WK15 seems the most likely answer at this point, although, if Mox loses to Eddie Kingston tonight at AEW Full Gear (he won’t), there is a window of opportunity there. Okada beats O-Khan, in the battle over Suzuko Mimori (I kid, I kid). Afterwards, Will Ospreay challenged Okada for a match at WK15, which Okada accepted. 

Shingo Takagi regains the NEVER Openweight title, so he can be the loser in the Annual Hirooki Goto NEVER Openweight Invitational Match at WK15. There are rumblings once more that Minoru Suzuki is not long for NJPW, with the new GLEAT shoot-style promotion headed by Kiyoshi Tamura, and run by LIDET (the now-former owners of Pro Wrestling NOAH, before selling to CyberAgent). That promotion has only run 1 show so far, and Suzuki’s BFF Nosawa Rongai has since left GLEAT. (Btw GLEAT is an actual word, and don’t look up what it means if you don’t have a strong stomach.) Suzuki was almost assuredly showing up in NOAH on 1/5/2020 and then appeared to challenge Jon Moxley instead. So who knows how this will go, if at all.

The cards for the Best of the Super Juniors 27 portion of the next tour have all been announced. I won’t be writing them here now, but in a future Upcoming NJPW Events post. Yoshinobu Kanemaru is still listed on the cards, so that knee injury must not have been serious. The World Tag League portions of the tour have yet to be announced, hoping that comes about soon, otherwise it’s going to be a mighty incomplete Events post (like the last one, bleagh).

Last night’s NJPW Strong episode was the second of their Road to Showdown series. I assume Showdown is next week, but they haven’t announced that yet. Indie wrestler JR Kratos made his NJPW debut on this show.

Fred Rosser d. Jordan Clearwater (Seated Dropkick, 5:29)

Chase Owens [Bullet Club] d. Danny Limelight (Package Driver, 8:25)

JR Kratos & Rust Taylor d. Jeff Cobb [FREE] & Rocky Romero [CHAOS] (Kratos > Romero, Game Changer, 13:20)

With a finisher like that, you’d think Kratos came from GCW, but actually, he is unsigned, and had done a tour with All Japan Pro Wrestling in the earlier, pre-lockdown parts of 2020. Mostly, I am just looking forward to some matches taped after G1 Climax, not before, at this point.

In more NJoA news, the full card and bracket for the Super J-Cup 2020 show being done on 12/12/2020 has been announced. One of the bigger announcements is this will see the first match from Young Lion excursionee Ren Narita on NJPWWorld in quite some time. Indeed, it’ll be his first official match since beating Aaron Williams in Black Label Pro on 2/29/2020. A bit surprising he hasn’t featured on NJPW Strong or Lion’s Break Collision at all since he’s been at the LA Dojo. In any event, here’s the card breakdown:

Super J-Cup 2020 - NJPW LA Dojo, 12/12/2020 (NJPWWorld, Fite TV)

Super J-Cup 2020 1st Round: Clark Connors v. Chris Bey [Impact]

Super J-Cup 2020 1st Round: ACH [FREE] v. TJP [FREE]

Super J-Cup 2020 1st Round: Rey Horus [ROH] v. Blake Christian [GCW]

Super J-Cup 2020 1st Round: Lio Rush [FREE] v. El Phantasmo [Bullet Club]

Super J-Cup 2020 Semifinal: TBA

Super J-Cup 2020 Semifinal: TBA

Ren Narita & Karl Fredericks v. KENTA & Hikuleo [Bullet Club]

Super J-Cup 2020 Final: TBA

That’s it for this one. Took me a while to get here, as in the middle of writing this, Joe Biden was declared the next President of the United States, so I was a little distracted for a bit. The next show is a week from tomorrow, 11/15/2020, the first night of the combined World Tag League 2020 + Best of the Super Juniors 27 tour. Hopefully there will be announcements of the WTL cards/participants soon. There will be an NJPW Strong on Friday too. We’re also planning a podcast in the next week in prep for the new tour. And hey, AEW Full Gear tonight too, if you are into that.