Jan 7, 2019 20:42:33 GMT KJ said:

There's some contractual quirks, though, right? NJPW contract goes through January, so can he announce he's going to sign elsewhere before his contract ends?

Well KUSHIDA’s contract ends Jan 31st and he made his official announcement that he was leaving and “going overseas.” So I guess he could announce that he was leaving but not say where he intends to sign?

Basically we just take what Omega says at face value until he shows up somewhere, but as wrestling fans we need to speculate as hard as possible to pass the time. :lol:

Omega tweeted from the airport overnight saying “until next time.”

SPECULATION TIME

Omega lives for being super vague and keeping people guessing. If I recall correctly he did something similar after losing to Okada two years ago at Wrestle Kingdom. He didn't appear on NJPW for a while, to sell the huge defeat. This isn't exactly the same but it's similar.

Jan 18, 2019 20:40:16 GMT Emperor said:

Omega lives for being super vague and keeping people guessing. If I recall correctly he did something similar after losing to Okada two years ago at Wrestle Kingdom. He didn't appear on NJPW for a while, to sell the huge defeat. This isn't exactly the same but it's similar.

I think it’s obvious that he’s signed with the WWE and is flying to the US to appear at the Royal Rumble, helping Finn Balor (founder of Bullet Club) defeat Brock Lesnar, then steal the Universal Championship and take it to AEW.

That was quite the twist at the end there. Keep it to the fan fiction forum though, RT. Your stuff is too good to just present willy nilly in any post for the casuals.

According to this article, it is pretty much all but announced that he is definitely going to AEW though and that he already turned down the WWE offer.

Per The Wrestling Observer, The New Beginning USA cards were supposed to have Liger, Nagata, Ishii, Goto, and Kojima as well as the American wrestlers that were booked on the card.

Due to the United States President's Government Shutdown, they were unable to get work visas.

If I bought tickets to those shows I'd be fucking livid. Look at the card they've put out with all those wrestlers being pulled. It's absolute garbage.

I was thinking of this news, looking at the card, and I started wondering ...

Did NJPW miss their chance to be a player in America?

They'll have a loyal following, but with the core American Bullet Club gone; Omega possibly leaving; and now this ... do they have a chance to be what they seemed to destined to become two years ago?

I'm not so sure ...

NJPW caught a break there.

Now they can pretend they were hard done by, when in reality they didn't care about those shows to begin with. When Ishii is by far the biggest name you were planning on having on the card, you know you're in trouble.

Liger and Nagata were going to be on the card too, but I think you're probably right to assume that Ishii is the guy American fans most want to see.

KJ raises a good point. The window has closed. They're not going to branch out and gain new fans with the stars they have now, or they would have already. Tanahashi and Okada have been in the main event picture for years, Jay White is pretty good but he's Kenny Omega Lite with no mainstream recognition, and Naito doesn't give a shit. Their most popular gaijin is fucking Juice Robinson.

With Cody, Omega & The Bucks gone, they're screwed.

Liger and Nagata haven't been relevant for years.

It's certainly going to be a challenge for Gedo, but he's proven himself in the past. Similar comments were made when Styles, Nakamura and Ibushi left all around the same time and he somehow turned a negative into a positive. I'd give him that chance once more.

I also feel like you're forgetting Will Ospreay. Maybe I'm out of the loop, but I'd put him right up there as one of the biggest names in Pro Wrestling.

Jan 25, 2019 3:55:19 GMT Big Pete said:

Liger and Nagata haven't been relevant for years.

It's certainly going to be a challenge for Gedo, but he's proven himself in the past. Similar comments were made when Styles, Nakamura and Ibushi left all around the same time and he somehow turned a negative into a positive. I'd give him that chance once more.

I also feel like you're forgetting Will Ospreay. Maybe I'm out of the loop, but I'd put him right up there as one of the biggest names in Pro Wrestling.

Yes I am forgetting Will Ospreay. Good call. And he posted after Wrestle Kingdom that he's looking for an apartment in Japan with his girlfriend, so he's staying long term.

I wouldn't say he's one of the biggest names in pro wrestling, but he very easily could be.

Of all the non-WWE talent, he'd have to be right up there wouldn't he?

It's an interesting case, especially when you compare Ospreay to Omega. Ospreay has more room to grow as a performer, but Omega had more opportunity to form a bigger impression. The cards fell right for Omega and I don't think Ospreay will have the same luxury.

I agree with you on White, I've seen a lot of improvement, but I don't think he has that broard appeal just yet.

Maybe he is up there, and I'm just out of the loop. It's hard to gauge what the average fan knows of outside of WWE.

I'd have to assume that most fans know of Kenny Omega and The Young Bucks. Most would know Cody because of his time in WWE. And if they know Omega, chances are they probably have heard Okada's name, and maaaybe Kota Ibushi.

Beyond that it's anyone's guess what average wrestling fans know of. Maybe I'm way off and fans know way more than I give them credit for thanks to the internet.

Jay White is too punchable to be a big name. Miles Teller look alike fuck. :@

From my experience, the average wrestling fan knows absolutely zero outside of WWE. You are overestimating the common knowledge if anything. Nine out of ten people I talk to that say they are wrestling fans give me weird looks when I say anything about Japan or Omega.

Jan 25, 2019 16:48:42 GMT Lionheart said:

From my experience, the average wrestling fan knows absolutely zero outside of WWE. You are overestimating the common knowledge if anything. Nine out of ten people I talk to that say they are wrestling fans give me weird looks when I say anything about Japan or Omega.

The conversation isn't that NJPW is now going to irrelevant, rather they lost their opportunity to become relevant.

It was always a long shot anyway. I mean, are the Young Bucks any more famous than Omega/Okada/Tanahashi/Naito to a WWE diehard fan? Cody Rhodes obviously has that WWE name recognition, but very few WWE diehards would have gone out of their way to see what he was up to after he left WWE. Only SM.

After this weekend I’m thinking about this thread again. And I’m looking at my MOTY posts in that thread and it’s absolutely dominated by WWE/NXT Matches. That’s the first time that’s happened, especially in such a short time after Wrestle Kingdom.

Takeover: Blackpool, Takeover: Phoenix and the Royal Rumble gave us some pretty quality matches. And Wrestlemania is looking like it will be pretty solid this year already. Then you pepper in random gems like Rey Mysterio vs Andrade on Smackdown as the year progresses (we will get at least a couple more great matches on Raw or SD guaranteed)...

Meanwhile look at New Beginning USA’s card. Granted the shutdown fucked them a little, but they still could throw in one of their big guns to make up for it. Okada doesn’t have a visa? Really?

ROH is a joke. Jeff Cobb is going to carry that place on his back. Their year isn’t looking great and they’re going to have to lean on NJPW’s talent again.

Hopefully AEW has some good matches this year and they probably will if they can pull together some good matches for Kenny Omega and Chris Jericho. But that remains to be seen.

Sorry maybe this belongs in another thread but man...the WWE is going to prove why they’re the big dog this year and I’m starting to get worried about their competition. In two years we went from “wrestling is better than ever around the world,” to “....is it though?”

The New Beginning in Sapporo is past us. Here's a recap of the events.

On the last Road To... show, KUSHIDA wrestled his last match - a special singles match against Tanahashi. The match was not great but KUSHIDA was the overwhelming crowd favourite and it must have been a joy for him to wrestle against his long time friend, partner, and idol. Tanahashi forced KUSHIDA to submit to the Texas Cloverleaf. KUSHIDA said a brief farewell to the fans. We'll see him next in NXT.

The first night saw Jay White force Tanahashi to submit to an Indian Deathlock in a crushing tag team defeat (White/Fale vs Tanahashi/Okada), albeit with a big assist from Gedo. The next challenger to the IWGP Championship once again stands tall.

The second night saw three title matches between members of LIJ and Suzuki-gun. LIJ entered with all the gold, and they left with all the gold. BUSHI/Shingo and EVIL/SANADA defeated Kanemaru/Desperado and Suzuki/ZSJ respectively in middle of the road tag team matches.

The main event is worthy of a longer recap, but not for good reasons. The match was overbooked and doomed to fail from the start. The premise: Taichi sets up his goon Iizuka to attack Naito with a ladder during his entrance. Taichi smirks to himself then goes to the ramp and hits his finisher. Naito is KO'd and taken to the back. 10 minutes of Taichi preening and posing and taunting. To be fair, he does a good job of keeping us entertained. Of course, Naito comes back, barely able to stand, and demands the match to start.

This is a no-win situation. If Taichi wins, then he beat a guy he crippled before the match. Big achievement. If Naito wins, then Taichi is just an awful wrestler. The only way to work such a match as to be competitive is for Taichi to endlessly stall and taunt to justify Naito getting into a match. At least that's not out of character for Taichi, but he's still an idiot. The match still managed to go to ridiculous levels of excess, with a piledriver through a table, lots of weapon shots, Naito bumping on his neck a million times, finisher kickouts aplenty, two ref-distract-low-blows, and after all that, Naito wins. Some entertaining moments, but mostly a waste of 45 minutes.

Best match of the weekend: EVIL vs ZSJ.

Holding out for Tanahashi vs. White at New Beginning Osaka.

Hopefully Tanahashi sends that no-good Switchy back to Auckland where he belongs.

Is it just me, or is the Junior Heavyweight division...lacking?

Ishimori goes from Ryusuke Taguchi and goes to Jushin Liger. Who's next? Tiger Mask?

Dammit Tanahashi!

Jay White continues to emulate his rival Kazuchika Okada by upsetting Hiroshi Tanahashi becoming the new IWGP World Heavyweight Champion.

With The Elite gone, Gedo has gone all out to ensure his meal ticket is the biggest star in the company.

Jay White winning the title just feels insulting after it took Omega so long.

Also, fuck him and his punchable face.

And his finisher sucks.

Wow Devitt was the worst leader of Bullet Club.

I never really expected Jay White to win. But he did. And now that he has, I think to myself, is it really that surprising? Gedo has done this before, at least twice. Okada. AJ Styles. He likes his shock title wins, typically shortly after Wrestle Kingdom. And the booking has certainly gone that way. It makes sense. Tanahashi had his resurgence, from August to January he was unstoppable. Won the G1, beat Jay White, Okada, Kenny Omega. He returned to his status as the Ace, and had another massive victory at the Tokyo Dome. The past had its glory, now Gedo looks to the future. Jay White is the new Kenny Omega. Gaijin/Bullet Club overlord.

That said, it's interesting to ask if this would have happened had Kenny not left the company. I'm sure giving White the title was on his mind, but he may also have been considering a scenario where Tanahashi holds the belt until Dominion for a big rematch with Kenny. But Kenny forced his hand, it seems.

Jay White as the champion opens a lot of doors for the future. Naito vs White has never happened. Okada vs White isn't over. Okada needs a big win over White. Perhaps Tanahashi does too. It's sudden, but a fresh face at the top of the mountain is welcome, and let's face it, White has been pushed hard for a long time.

The more I reflect on it, the more I like it. Let's see what the future holds.

The other big news coming out of New Beginning Osaka is that Ibushi is staying with NJPW, returning for the New Japan Cup in March. Fantastic news.

Feb 11, 2019 19:12:27 GMT @ness said:

Wow Devitt was the worst leader of Bullet Club.

You shut your whore mouth. There wouldn't even be a Bullet Club if it weren't for DA REAL ROCK N ROLLA.

I'm pissed Jay White won but I guess that's the point.

As for Omega, I wouldn't be surprised if Gedo and co. pulled the trigger on Jay White as a little "fuck you for leaving" towards him. I know his new AEW contract allows him to continue working with NJPW, and he obviously will in the future, but I doubt it's any time soon and I wouldn't be surprised if NJPW were bitter about him leaving with the rest.

Feb 11, 2019 21:29:40 GMT Emperor said:

I never really expected Jay White to win. But he did. And now that he has, I think to myself, is it really that surprising? Gedo has done this before, at least twice. Okada. AJ Styles. He likes his shock title wins, typically shortly after Wrestle Kingdom. And the booking has certainly gone that way. It makes sense. Tanahashi had his resurgence, from August to January he was unstoppable. Won the G1, beat Jay White, Okada, Kenny Omega. He returned to his status as the Ace, and had another massive victory at the Tokyo Dome. The past had its glory, now Gedo looks to the future. Jay White is the new Kenny Omega. Gaijin/Bullet Club overlord.

That said, it's interesting to ask if this would have happened had Kenny not left the company. I'm sure giving White the title was on his mind, but he may also have been considering a scenario where Tanahashi holds the belt until Dominion for a big rematch with Kenny. But Kenny forced his hand, it seems.

Jay White as the champion opens a lot of doors for the future. Naito vs White has never happened. Okada vs White isn't over. Okada needs a big win over White. Perhaps Tanahashi does too. It's sudden, but a fresh face at the top of the mountain is welcome, and let's face it, White has been pushed hard for a long time.

The more I reflect on it, the more I like it. Let's see what the future holds.

I think if Omega inked a new deal with NJPW before Wrestle Kingdom he would have retained the title. After the way they booked Omega/Okada over the past couple years, once he got that win and got the title, he should have been unbeatable.

Maybe this is a blessing, because knowing Gedo, Jay White was always the plan and it would have been Omega he took the title off of this weekend. THAT would have been infuriating.