There is a major internal shakeup going on. I don’t have all the details but the fallout is that Tokyo Sports reported on 6/4 is that all the wrestlers were planning on leaving the company and that Jun Akiyama would start up as the president of a new company on 7/1. All the wrestlers had only signed six month deals, which says something about owner Nobuo Shiraishi’s commitment, so all contracts expired on 6/30 and the wrestlers are free to leave. As best we can tell, and this was all breaking at press time, is that all of the wrestlers are tired of Shiraishi and his decisions regarding running the company and the things he says in social media and they want out. They cite the decline in attendance to show that his direction isn’t working. The attendance wasn’t good at the start and the promotion was deep in red ink when Shiraishi bought the company after years of management by Keiji Muto. Muto and Shiraishi had problems from the start which led to Muto leaving and forming Wrestle-1, taking much of the talent with him, and business plunged even more. The wrestlers want to completely revamp the product. Akiyama would be the public face of the company as the biggest star but the guys who were handling the wrestling end were referee Kyohei Wada and veteran Masa Fuchi. Nobody wants to work for Shiraishi but right now they don’t have access to any financial support. Akiyama has reportedly talked with Motoko Baba about getting back into pro wrestling as the owner. I can’t see that at all, since she retired in 2002 and had no more interest at that point in her life to run the company or carry on the business without her husband, who passed away in 1999. Plus, almost all the wrestlers that were around in 2000, including Akiyama, quit All Japan largely because of her, to form Pro Wrestling NOAH. There is talk of them starting up and having to use a different name if Shiraishi doesn’t sell or give up power. Other things said are that the first show of the new group would be 7/12 in Osaka and that they are talking with Baba about reviving the original three belts from the 70s, the old PWF, International and United National belts for the Triple Crown. Baba owned the belts themselves and spent years trying to get them back as Muto, when he was president, never returned them to her. Shiraishi created a new Triple Crown singular belt and returned the original belts to Baba.
Triple Crown champion Akebono, 45, who hovers near 500 pounds, had been out of action due to pneumonia for the last six weeks. He was discharged from the hospital, but was brought back in due to an irregular heartbeat. All Japan this past week finally announced that he was going to have to vacate the title and they will have a match on 6/15 at Korakuen Hall to determine the new champion, between Takao Omori, who won the Champion Carnival, and Akiyama, who is the company’s biggest name wrestler.
With KENTA gone, it looks like they are trying to build around Takashi Sugiura & Masato Tanaka as a tag team as the kinds of both NOAH and Zero-One. Sugiura & Tanaka hold the NWA Intercontinental tag titles for Zero-One and earned a GHC tag title shot winning the Global Tag Team tournament last month. That shot took place on 5/31 at Differ Ariake, and they won the titles from Takeshi Morishima & Maybach Taniguchi in 23:19 when Tanaka hit Taniguchi with the sliding D and Sugiura followed with the Olympic slam. The bad news is that in their home arena, they only drew about 900 fans (announced as 1,200), much lower than they usually had been doing in the building, for the company’s first significant show in the market since KENTA’s farewell. Also, Sugiura did not appear at the 6/4 show in Aizu Wakamatsu, and they said he was off the rest of the tour due to poor physical condition, which doesn’t help the talent depth issue. Sugiura is 44 and has working a hard, physical style forever as he used to take beatings in matches even on his way up. They had another title match on the show as Daisuke Harada retained the GHC jr. title beating Quiet Storm in 16:01 with a German suplex.
There is a story regarding Taichi that has gotten some mainstream pub in Japan. Taichi, who is married, had risque photos taken with another woman. In an unbelievable lack of common sense, had posted them on the Internet. When the story broke, there was a lot of speculation that he would be kicked off of the Super Juniors tournament. New Japan Chairman Naoki Sugabayashi said that Taichi could participate in the tournament but that they are investigating the situation and said that he could get a warning, a fine or even a suspension.
Togi Makabe ended up with a broken jaw from the kick by Hirooki Goto in the tag team match on the 5/25 show at the Yokohama Arena. The spot was Goto & Katsuyori Shibata going for a double clothesline as Makabe came off the ropes, him ducking and his usual spot is coming off the other side and clotheslining both. However, in crossing up the usual, when he came off the ropes, they both threw a kick aimed at his chest. However, for him to make it look like he was doing the double clothesline, it required him to lean forward, and in doing so, Goto’s kick nailed his chin and mouth and his lower lip in particular just got smashed.
Karl Anderson seems to have a lot of input now in bringing new foreigners in. Besides Adam Cole, who we’ve mentioned already, it looks like several new wrestlers from the U.S. will be debuting here in a few months.
. Hate that morality clause shyt in general, though.
I didn't love age of the fall but I could see how Tyler black could be good in wwe these other guys though not so much