NJPW New Japan Cup 2016 participants, tournament bracket revealed

The field and bracket for NJPW’s New Japan Cup 2016 tournament have been announced

New Japan Pro Wrestling does many things differently and better than any other wrestling promotions around the world, but the most notable is by far their pushing of tournament formats. The G1 Climax is a can’t miss annual event, but not far behind is the famed New Japan Cup, which is just on the horizon for NJPW as it begins on March 3.

Early on Monday in Japan (late Sunday night stateside), NJPW announced the participants and the bracket for the New Japan Cup 2016 and, even with the likes of AJ Styles, Shinsuke Nakamura, and most recently Kota Ibushi not being with the company to take place in the event, the field is absolutely stacked and filled with potentially incredible matches.

From top to bottom on the bracket, here’s a look at the 16 wrestlers and eight first-round matches that will be taking place in the New Japan Cup 2016:

Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Bad Luck Fale
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Michael Elgin
Togi Makabe vs. Tama Tonga
Yuji Nagata vs. Hirooki Goto

Tomoaki Honma vs. Satoshi Kojima
Toru Yano vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Tomohiro Ishii vs. EVIL
Yoshi-Hashi vs. Tetsuya Naito

Differing from the G1 Climax and its round-robin format, the New Japan Cup is a single-elimination tournament. However, the stakes are almost just as high as the winner of New Japan Cup 2016 will have the opportunity to choose between challenging for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, IWGP Intercontinental Championship, or NEVER Openweight Championship at NJPW’s big pay-per-view event in April, Invasion Attack 2016.

Looking at the bracket right now, you’d have to say that Hiroshi Tanahashi is the favorite to come out of the top half and that Tetsuya Naito would be the favorite to meet Tanahashi in the Finals. That’s obviously just speculation, but that’s the way it looks from here.

NJPW fans will certainly find out what will happen soon enough, though. New Japan Cup 2016 starts with first round on March 3 and the second round taking place the following night on March 4. The semifinals and finals will then be held on the same night, March 12.