The G1 Climax enters its final weekend with two nights at the Ariake Arena.
The annual tournament, which began in 1991, has become the cornerstone of the New Japan calendar as it has ascended to become the most prestigious tournament in the industry.
It has grown and expanded over the years into a month-long affair with wider accessibility, beginning in 2013 on Ustream, and is now a staple on New Japan World, where every tournament show and match is live.
But it’s a tumultuous time for New Japan, where attendance this year has sunk, failing to attract 3,000 fans for any shows until this weekend.
The wrestling has been consistent throughout the tournament with standout performances from Konosuke Takeshita, Shingo Takagi, Zack Sabre Jr., Yuya Uemura, Ryohei Oiwa, Drilla Moloney, and the list goes on. The usual House of Torture fare is prevalent through three participants, but it hasn’t bogged down the G1 to such a degree that it’s hampered the show’s overall quality. Plus, it was the final G1 for Hiroshi Tanahashi as a sub-story throughout the past month.
The final four is set with Zack Sabre Jr. taking on Konosuke Takeshita and EVIL meeting Yota Tsuji on Saturday, and the two winners squaring off Sunday for the second night at the Ariake Arena.
The IWGP World Heavyweight Champion outpaced every participant with fourteen points in the round-robin stage, only losing to Shota Umino (avenging his defeat at Wrestle Kingdom 19) and Ren Narita. ZSJ already beat Takeshita on the July 30 card in Yamato, so having Takeshita earn the win sets up three possible matches for Zack over the ensuing months before the Tokyo Dome. The other play is a rematch of last year’s G1 final, where ZSJ beat Tsuji.
Most assume Tsuji is punching his ticket to the final over EVIL, as it would seem to be a massive blown opportunity to have Tsuji come up short when this year’s G1 desperately needs an ascension among its younger blood. You can argue that last year was the time to go hard with Tsuji, Uemura, Umino, Narita, etc. Instead, it was Tsuji reaching the summit and stumbling in the final and working his way back.
Takeshita is a unique case because, as New Japan is seeking its next breakout “Ace”, he checks every box other than being a non-exclusive performer with a dual contract. Does that matter in the modern era? It’s a reality New Japan must accept that plenty of performers – native and foreign – are going to be enticed by the escalating guarantees of working for a WWE or AEW, and the fame that accompanies those contracts. In a world where Kazuchika Okada left New Japan, no one can be considered a “lock” as a lifer in the company, and with that, New Japan will need to acquiesce and make it less of an imperative that stars of the caliber of Takeshita are disqualified from its championship picture.
G1 was not the priority it was in past years, with the tournament tough to stay up to date with during the best of times, and it’s a wrestling ecosystem that is flooded with high-quality matches at a dizzying pace. No one who consumed this year’s tournament can complain that the wrestling wasn’t at a high level, but it’s harder than ever to stand out with great wrestling.
NJPW has a star problem with its paying audience in Japan, and no attendance figure should have been more concerning than its July 25 show at Ota Ward Gymnasium, which managed only 1,300 people. It’s not a case of the cupboards being bare because the talent is evident, and with a wave of rising stars like Gabe Kidd, the unexpected breakout of Drilla Moloney, and all its native talent, it becomes a question of “how” they are being utilized to their full potential.
Gedo has made a resume out of the slow rise and seeing stars fail and fail to maximize the victory. It’s a sound formula, but arguably his greatest project was taking a 24-year-old Okada and jettisoning him to the IWGP championship when no one expected it or thought he was ready. It was an aggressive and bold booking decision that told the audience “This is our guy” and you had the right mix of a performer who more than rose to the occasion and was deemed “new” and “fresh” and that mix works well to a fanbase, thus, creating new matches and a new player in the mix. NOAH experienced a similar situation this year with OZAWA and opting to attach a rocket to him rather than play the long game.
The next opportunity for this experiment comes with Olympic gold medalist Aaron Wolf. Again, he may not be ready for such a push, but New Japan is highly incentivized to try, and his debut next January will be a major deal for the company.
While it’s too early to assign a Grade to this year’s G1 until the final weekend wraps, it will be a disappointing one from the standpoint of its paltry attendance for a rebuilding promotion that is now in the era of battling the ghosts of the prior era where Kazuchika Okada, Tetsuya Naito, and soon Hiroshi Tanahashi are gone and leaves massive shoes to fill.
Saturday, August 16 – 4 a.m. ET at Ariake Arena
*G1 Climax – Semi-Final: Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Konosuke Takeshita
*G1 Climax – Semi-Final: Yota Tsuji vs. EVIL
*Ryohei Oiwa, Kosei Fujita & Hartley Jackson vs. Ren Narita, SHO & DOUKI
*SANADA & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs. Drilla Moloney & Taiji Ishimori
*Shingo Takagi & Daiki Nagai vs. David Finlay & Gedo
*Hiroshi Tanahashi, El Phantasmo & Katsuya Murashima vs. Great O-Khan, Callum Newman & Jakob Austin Young
*Oleg Boltin & Tomoaki Honma vs. Don Fale & Yujiro
*Shota Umino, Yuya Uemura, El Desperado, YOSHI-HASHI & Ryusuke Taguchi vs. Taichi, Satoshi Kojima, Master Wato, YOH & Toru Yano
