NJPW G1 29 Night 4: Ishii and White tear the house down in Hokkaido

Day 4 of the NJPW G1 Climax 29 tournament headed to Hokkaido and featured the next round of B-Block matches, including Tomohiro Ishii and Jay White stealing the show.

Results roundup: 

• Kota Ibushi and Jushin “Thunder” Liger def. Yota Tsuji and Shota Umino
• EVIL, SANADA & BUSHI def. Toa Henare, Ren Narita & Tomaki Honma
• Yoshinobu Kanemaru, Lance Archer, Zack Sabre Jr. & Minoru Suzuki def. Hiroshi Tanahashi, KENTA, Karl Fredericks & Clark Connors
• Kazuchika Okada and YOSHI-HASHI def. Bad Luck Fale and Chase Owens
• B Block: Shingo Takagi (2) def. Toru Yano (2)
• B Block: Juice Robinson (4) def. Hirooki Goto (2)
• B Block: Jon Moxley (4) def. Jeff Cobb (0)
• B Block: Tomohiro Ishii (4) def. Jay White (0)
• B Block: Taichi (2) def. Tetsuya Naito (0)

Kota Ibushi and Jushin “Thunder” Liger def. Yota Tsuji and Shota Umino

Roughly 7,000 people were in attendance on Monday night in Hokkaido. They announced that Will Ospreay  would not be participating in the undercard tag team match. The bout was to feature both he and rookie Yuya Uemura.

This match was a good, quick opener. This was mainly a showcase for Jushin Liger since it would be his last in-ring appearance in Hokkaido this year. This shouldn’t come as a surprise but he and all involved looked on point, as per usual.

Liger mixed things up with Shota Umino early on. He showed off some Mexican-style llave submissions on Umino, ahead of his upcoming Arena Mexico appearance this Friday.

Umino rallied back early against both Liger and later Ibushi. I’m not sure what’s gotten into the Jon Moxley-christened “Shooter” lately but tonight he wrestled with more spice than usual; he even shoved a referee out of the way at one point so that he could beat on Yota Tsuji some more.

Tsuji is even more fiery than Umino in general and exhibited that here tonight. He and a few of his NJPW Dojo-mates often feel like throwbacks to the ‘90s Showa-style approach to wrestling and it’s always a blast to watch.

Ibushi is said to be injured still and didn’t do all that much in this match — well, aside from winning the match for his team. He finished Tsuji off with a somewhat out-of-character submission, a brutal high-angle single-leg crab, to lead he and Liger to the fast win. Liger grabbed the mic afterwards and explained that this would be his last appearance in Hokkaido and wanted to thank them for their support before he retires. Very classy.

EVIL, SANADA & BUSHI def. Toa Henare, Ren Narita & Tomaki Honma

Another short match that centered on the building tension within Los Ingernobles de Japan, and specifically between EVIL and SANADA. Before the match, they gave each other intense looks as BUSHI tried his best to stay out of the way.

Young Lion Ren Narita stormed EVIL at the bell. He threw elbows and boots at EVIL but nothing would stick, or EVIL wouldn’t sell them (choose your own reality). Narita was finally able to knock EVIL off his feet with a big dropkick.

Toa Henare and Tomoaki Honma made brief fan-service appearances. The two did a double-team kokeshi spot that the crowd was quite into. Henare really needs to be unleashed eventually. He looked great here. Later, he did three deadlift suplex reps with SANADA before planting him back-first on the mat.

SANADA was significantly over in Hokkaido but he didn’t wrestle too much in this bout. It’s par for the course in these round robin tournaments, otherwise everyone’s bodies would fall apart.

BUSHI pinned Narita after landing an MX. After the match, SANADA and EVIL had a pretty gripping showdown that ended in a quasi-swerve that saw EVIL attempting an ambush on SANADA behind his back. He tried hitting Everything Is Evil but SANADA countered and locked in a Cold Skull dragon sleeper for a second until EVIL slipped out.

The two continued eyeballing each other as BUSHI stood with his hands folded on his head, unsure of what to do in an excellent, simple angle. The LIJ tag partners will go head-to-head this Thursday at Korakuen Hall.

Yoshinobu Kanemaru, Lance Archer, Zack Sabre Jr. & Minoru Suzuki def. Hiroshi Tanahashi, KENTA, Karl Fredericks & Clark Connors

This was all storytelling with a side of mayhem. Suzuki-gun jumped their opponents before the match got underway and things quickly spilled out onto the floor. After a few minutes the match inside the ring finally got underway.

KENTA and Lance Archer — who have a match this coming Thursday in Tokyo — kicked things off for their teams. Archer towered over KENTA, though the latter held his own with the American Psycho. When KENTA went to tag out, Tanahashi insisted on being tagged in. KENTA went with Karl Fredericks, the explosive rookie from NJPW’s LA Dojo, instead. The crowd ate that part up, especially with regard to what happened between the two wrestlers after their match last night.

Fredericks was very good but played whipping boy in this match, especially when Minoru Suzuki came in, as the two went on a short and painful trip to Suzuki’s woodshed. One of the elbows he laid into Fredericks sounded like a baseball bat smashing a raw steak.

Things went chaotic again soon after this beating, with all wrestlers hitting the floor once more. Suzuki scared Rocky Romero from the English announce table, which led to Archer sitting in Romero’s seat moments later. Archer threw on a headset and cut an impromptu promo on KENTA, mentioning their coming bout this week.

A minute later he was back in the match. Talk about multitasking. Suzuki also menaced the Japanese announce team to the left and even threw a chair at them that landed against the guardrail.

Later on in the match, Tana and KENTA jostled each other out of the way as they stood in their corner waiting for Karl Fredericks to make his way to their side to tag out. KENTA wanted in but so did Tanahashi. Eventually, Tana held KENTA off and made his way into the match.

It was all for naught, though, as moments later Yoshinobu Kanemaru dashed in and landed his signature Deep Impact diving DDT on Clark Connors to pick up the win. Suzuki-gun continued to bully and torture their opponents after the match, with ZSJ twisting Tanahashi’s knees into knots on the apron, not letting go.

Tana had to be helped to the back and KENTA was visibly upset by the attack. Good match with even smarter booking. We essentially got a two-for-one ahead of Thursday with brief previews of Tana vs. ZSJ and Archer vs. KENTA at Korakuen this week.

Kazuchika Okada and YOSHI-HASHI def. Bad Luck Fale and Chase Owens

Okada and Fale also have a match on Thursday. Owens bullied YOSHI-HASHI around at the start but YH pushed back. He always found himself fighting from behind. The match spilled to the floor and Fale choked Okada with output cables. People in the crowd sounded like they only wanted to see Okada.

Towards the end, YOSHI-HASHI decked Fale with a big lariat that dumped both men over the top rope and back to the outside, and within just another few minutes Okada was able to dust Owens with a Rainmaker for the pin and win.

B Block: Shingo Takagi (2) def. Toru Yano (2)

Takagi attacked Yano while Yano was taking his I AM TAISHI! T-shirt off. I found pleasure in this. Is that bad? Yano then threw his shirt in Takagi’s face and went to rip the ring pads from the turnbuckle. He then went to the floor and set up a chair and sat in it, basically baiting Takagi to come out and fight him. Takagi ran after Yano but Yano used a drop toehold and Takagi smashed himself face-first into the seat of said folding chair.

Yano really wanted the count-out win here so he barricaded Takagi inside the crowd by using the guardrails and a table to block his path to the ring. Takagi barely made it back and was even nailed with the turnbuckle padding by Yano at the count of 19.

Takagi blocked a Yano low blow. He later sprinted after Yano in the corner, but Yano was able to shove referee Marty Asami in the way like a human shield, then shoved Takagi into Asami. The referee slumped down into the corner as Yano snuck a red steel chair that was lying in the opposite corner and passed it to Takagi, so that when Asami had recovered it’d look like Takagi had hit Yano with a chair.

Yano sold his face like he’d been decked with it and Asami mistakenly went after Takagi about this. BUSHI came to the ring, too, and distracted Asami, the chair still in Takagi’s hands. Yano bragged to the crowd about how smart he was and pointed at his brain until Takagi duffed Yano with the chair and then a stiff Pumping Bomber lariat to win the match. This was your typical Toru Yano G1 match made better with how explosive and fun to watch Takagi is.

New Japan then announced that they will be back in Hokkaido prefecture next year on Feb. 1 and 2, 2020 for their New Beginning tour.

B Block: Juice Robinson (4) def. Hirooki Goto (2)

There wasn’t much to this match and just as little to say about it. It was fine but without as much vitality or color as the other matches in the tournament so far. Robinson landed a big Booker T-style axe kick early on. At around nine minutes in, Goto landed an ushigoroshi for two. Like in his match with Shingo Takagi, Robinson primarily wrestled from behind while Goto dominated much of this. Robinson came back with a jackhammer for two.

Near the end, Robinson went for a left haymaker but Goto blocked it with a headbutt and Robinson ended up punching the top of Goto’s head instead of the jaw. Goto went for his own punch but Robinson matched Goto’s headbutt with one of his own, then followed up with the Left Hand of God and Pulp Friction to pick up another win.

B Block: Jon Moxley (4) def. Jeff Cobb (0)

This was a short, all-action match that lasted about eight minutes. Moxley walked through the crowd with “Shooter” Shota Umino carrying his belt and sporting a Death Rider shirt. Once the bell had rung, both engaged in rapid-paced mat wrestling. They moved at twice the speed Goto and Robinson were at in the match prior.

Moxley worked over Cobb’s left arm for most of this match. Once, when Cobb made it to the ropes for a break and referee Red Shoes began counting to five, Moxley broke the hold and bowed in apology, to the delight of the crowd, of course.

Moxley used a tope suicida on Cobb outside of the ring. They brawled on the entrance ramp and did a double clothesline spot and both spent a minute selling that. Mox broke the count and continued working over Cobb’s arm on the outside. It was great focused brawling, brawling with intent; it was clear to the audience how badly he was trying to damage Cobb’s arm, making the story simple and easy to follow. Cobb’s selling throughout this was impressive, too, because it’s something a lot of big men get ragged on for, not selling enough.

There were a couple points in this match where the crowd would be so quiet that an English-speaker could clearly hear them calling their spots, like when someone spit out “superkick!” right before Cobb stuck Moxley with one.

The finish came at around the time where both fought on the apron. Cobb teased a suplex to the floor but Moxley blocked it and stomped on Cobb’s feet to force him to break the waist lock. Cobb creamed Moxley back into the ring with a hard lariat after this, but it was no use because he ate a draping Death Rider DDT and a pin from Moxley.

B Block: Tomohiro Ishii (4) def. Jay White (0)

What a brilliant, satisfying match. As soon as the match was underway and the crowd began chanting for Ishii, White rolled out of the ring. He insisted on Ishii coming down to the floor to fight him because he claimed he decides where the fight should be.

Ishii rolled out, White rolled back in, to Gedo’s delight. Ishii grabbed Gedo by the collar until White slithered back to the floor to attack Ishii from behind but Ishii held his own and brought the match to a proper start inside the ring, this time to the crowd’s delight.

There was more funny business from Gedo moments later. He tripped Ishii as he ran the ropes and gave White an opening to land some forearms. Action was back on the floor again and quickly, this time with Ishii looking fed up and reaching over the announce table to grab a chair. You could hear Gedo scream “Oh, s–t!” offscreen. Ishii tossed the chair at White but it missed and hit the guardrail. Gedo decked Ishii but it didn’t do anything other than piss Ishii off, but it again gave White another chance to land a few more cheap shots while Ishii’s attention was elsewhere.

The middle part of this was mostly hard-hitting back and forth action, with White getting a tad more in than Ishii. Both worked hard. Ishii began no-selling all of White’s strikes in the middle of the mat and even leaned into one of his strikes and bowled White backwards. White’s facial expressions here where subtle but clear to notice, a look of indignant fear and surprise.

Ishii landed a huge stalling, jumping superplex from the second rope for a close two that woke the crowd up. Later, White spiked Ishii with a vicious sleeper suplex onto the top of his head. Yikes. Ishii was back up within a few seconds though and threw White over his head with a German suplex of his own. After he landed a big Riki lariat the place became unglued. He planted White with a Tenryu-style power bomb with a stacking pin for another very close two.

You could hero Gedo screaming “Jay! Jay!” like an evil version of Mickey from the Rocky movies. He got up on the apron for long enough to distract Red Shoes and for White to recover in the kerfuffle. White went for a Bladerunner but countered and landed a big sliding lariat for an exciting two-count. The crowd was rocking. They had rapid-fire exchange of moves that capped off when White went for another Bladerunner but Ishii countered it into a flatliner, then a blistering lariat for a thr- oh, so close. The Hokkaido Prefectural Sports Center had come unglued.

After a vertical drop brainbuster the match was over, Ishii picked up the win, justice was served. “Whatddya think about that, huh?!” was Kevin Kelly’s classic call after the pin. Speaking of Kelly, he did a wonderful job in between matches conveying tidbits of NJPW history, like after this match when he went over the Riki Choshu/Yoshiaki Fujiwara fiasco in the 80s.

B Block: Taichi (2) def. Tetsuya Naito (0)

This was an interesting match that didn’t get good until the end. Miho Abe accompanied Taichi to the ring. He had a number of boisterous fans in the crowd tonight because he’s from the same prefecture, Hokkaido. Taichi also brought with him ex-Suzuki-gun member Takashi Iizuka’s mystical iron claw to the ring. He kept in in a fanny pack of sorts.

Taichi avoided Naito as they circled each in the ring. Taichi kept doing the cheesy heel “I’m not ready yet!” schtick so Naito laid flat on his back and begged Taichi to do something. Taichi took the bait and was small packaged for a very close two.

There was a spot early on that I was really unimpressed by. Taichi put Miho Abe in front of him and ran away, doing the chicken spot, but Naito actually grabbed Abe by the hair like he was going to deck her but just did the tranquilo pose. For some reason it really bugged me, or maybe it felt a bit too real, because while Abe’s character is a heel I do not desire her hurt for the sake of it. It came off poorly and they should rethink doing any similar spots in the future. It’s old fashioned cheap heat and not in the good way. They should know better.

That’s a bit out of proportion with the actual quality of this match, which wasn’t great but wasn’t bad. It was to be expected based on their Japanese rudo personas. The match was filled with brawling around the ring: Chairs, guardrail spots, spitting.

The crowd came back to the match midway through when Taichi drilled Naito with a Dangerous Backdrop suplex that’d make his trainer proud.

Taichi finally busted out Chekov’s — er Iizuka’s — Iron Claw while Kanemaru distracted the ref. When he went to nail Naito with it, Naito dropkicked him in the knee. The Claw bounced out of the ring.

They did a Kawada-Misawa ganso bomb spot but no one seemed to get it. Naito scored a low blow after shoving Red Shoes (note: they do this way too much) out of the way, then landed Destino but only scored two because Kanemaru dragged RS out of the ring. Taichi landed Black Mephisto but it wasn’t enough to finish the match. I’m convinced they were doing some sort of All Japan tribute towards the end of this.

Naito accidentally took Red Shoes out with a flying shoulder tackle when Taichi shoved him in the way (again). Kanemaru tried spitting whisky in Naito’s face but he blocked it. Taichi grabbed the Iron Claw again. It didn’t work out and he ended up eating another Destino but this time RS was still knocked out.

Taichi landed an ugly superkick for a nearfall as the 20-minute call sounded. Taichi finally duffed Naito with the Claw and did the Kawada stacking power bomb for the victory. Naito has yet to score in this year’s G1.

Current G1 Standings

A Block

• Kazuchika Okada 4
• KENTA 4
• Lance Archer 4
• SANADA 2
• Bad Luck Fale 2
• EVIL 2
• Will Ospreay 2
• Kota Ibushi 0
• Zack Sabre Jr. 0
• Hiroshi Tanahashi 0

B Block

• Juice Robinson 4
• Jon Moxley 4
• Tomohiro Ishii 4
• Hirooki Goto 2
• Toru Yano 2
• Shingo Takagi 2
• Taichi 2
• Tetsuya Naito 0
• Jeff Cobb 0
• Jay White 0