The Navigation Log 3.16.08: Global Tag League Schedule and GATE OF GENERATION

Posted by Matt Short on 03.16.2008

We've got the full line-up for NOAH's Global Tag League tournament as well as a preview of Dragon Gate's GATE OF GENERATION PPV. Plus, we're featuring a Japanese indy dream match between two former members of The Italian Connection!

I'm not necessarily the type of person you'd think would be interested in politics. Even if I wasn't, anyone would be hard pressed to ignore the Barack Obama vs. Hillary Clinton death struggle. People have said it from the beginning, but this has been Hillary's primary to lose and she's having a real go at it. But last time I checked, the color scheme of this section was blue, not yellow. So…

Onto the Navigation Log!

Global Tag League Line-up
The full schedule and rules for the Global Tag League tour have been released. The tournament will be round-robin style with 2 points awarded to a winning team, 1 point for a time limit draw, and 0 points for a double count-out or DQ finish. Any ties at the end of the initial I love round-robin tournaments as it opens the field a little more and even gives teams that aren't going to win the whole thing pick up some wins along the way. That's opposed of course to the single round matches where you might end up with an obvious first round match with a main eventer going up against a mid-carder who could actually use a little boost with a tournament win. That can still happen in a round-robin tournament, but the mid-carder isn't going to be completely out of it if they lose one match and still manage to have a good showing in the rest of the tournament.

The following is the line-up of tournament matches for the next month long tour:

3/29
Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima vs. D-Lo Brown & Buchanan
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio vs. Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone

3/30
Akitoshi Saito & Bison Smith vs. D-Lo Brown & Buchanan
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura vs. Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima

4/1
Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. D-Lo Brown & Buchanan
Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano vs. Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima

4/4
Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki vs. Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima

4/5
Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki vs. D-Lo Brown & Buchanan
Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano vs. Akitoshi Saito & Bison Smith
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura vs. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa

4/6
Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone vs. Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio vs. Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano

4/8
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura vs. Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki

4/10
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio vs. Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki
Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone vs. Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano

4/12
Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki vs. Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura vs. Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio
Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima

4/13
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura vs. Akitoshi Saito & Bison Smith
Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone vs. Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa

4/15
Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone vs. Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima

4/17
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio vs. D-Lo Brown & Buchanan

4/19
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio vs. Akitoshi Saito & Bison Smith

4/20
Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone vs. Akitoshi Saito & Bison Smith
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura vs. Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano
Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio

4/22
Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano vs. D-Lo Brown & Buchanan

4/23
Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone vs. D-Lo Brown & Buchanan
Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki vs. Akitoshi Saito & Bison Smith
Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano

4/25
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura vs. D-Lo Brown & Buchanan
Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki

4/27
Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa vs. Akitoshi Saito & Bison Smith
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio vs. Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura vs. Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone

Here's the real advantage of this tournament. You've got a whole month of big time tag team matches. Not just the fact that they're tournament matches, but you have some legitimate Budokan main events lined up. Every match is a strong one and I expect that this massive tag team tournament like this with big names lined up will be the kind of thing that gives NOAH a big boost in drawing in crowds. Especially in the areas outside of Tokyo where they've been having trouble doing so.

GATE OF GENERATION Preview
The big Dragon Gate PPV is upon us and DG is putting on an interesting card filled with some names from the past and some names you'd never expect to see on a Dragon Gate show. This a full, match-by-match preview of this big event.

Tokyo, Ota-ku Gymnasium: Dragon Gate GATE OF GENERATION

Akira Tozawa, Super Shenlong & King Ali Baba vs. Shinobu, Cyber Kong, Shisa BOY
-What we've got here is a basic undercard six-man. Super Shenlong is replacing Tozawa's Metabolic Bro. partner Yuki Ono who went out with a broken bone at another wrestling promotion's show. Shinobu and Cyber Kong are representing New Hazard here, while Shisa BOY will be coming from Dragon Gate NEX. The really interesting thing here is King Ali Baba, who was regular performer in the old Toryumon promotion who recently has been appearing on Dragon Gate shows. He's been doing well and picking up a lot of wins and I expect that to continue here.

Winners: Tozawa, Super Shenlong, & King Ali Baba

Genki Horiguchi vs. Anthony W. Mori
-This could be a fun contest, but I don't see Mori going over Horiguchi.

Winner: Genki Horiguchi

Taku Iwasa & Kenichiro Arai vs. El Blazer & PAC
-Another match featuring a Toryumon graduate coming to Dragon Gate, the highly flip-able El Blazer has made a name for himself throughout Japan as being one of the best high-flyers around, innovating spots and just generally risking his neck every time he goes out to wrestle under one of his many different personas. It seems fitting he's being paired with PAC, who some would say is his British counterpart. But their going up against the Open the Twin Gate champions here and Iwasa & Arai have been going strong, picking up their first defense against CIMA & Dragon Kid. The champs shouldn't lose any momentum here.

Winners: Taku Iwasa & Kenichiro Arai

YAMATO vs. Naoki Tanisaki
-Last week I talked about Tanisaki's surprise return to Dragon Gate. Turns out that it's probably the biggest thing happening on the Japanese indy circuit right now. The biggest impact that it's had was Shuji Kondo disbanded his SUKIYAKI stable in El Dorado after hearing about Tanisaki's jump to DG. Tanisaki has people's attention, but it's going to be up to him to capitalize on it. Tanisaki was never famous for winning a lot in Dragon Gate (and since his return he still has yet to win). This will be his chance to prove he's worth caring about in Dragon Gate.

Winner: Naoki Tanisaki

Don Fujii & Masaaki Mochizuki vs. Masato Tanaka & Tetsuhiro Kuroda
-More outsiders in this match as the former ECW Champion Masato Tanaka and Tetsuhiro Kuroda take on two former Open the Dream Gate champions in Fuji and Mochizuki. This is going to be a hard-hitting power battle and I'll expect the Dragon Gate Team to pull out the win.

Winners: Don Fuji & Masaaki Mochizuki

Open the Triangle Gate Next Challenger Decision, Losers are Barred from Challenging for the Titles: Susumu Yokosuka, Ryo Saito, & Dragon Kid vs. Naruki Doi, Yasushi Kanda, & Gamma
-Interesting trios here. The stipulation doesn't really make sense to me though, as the Triangle Gate titles reflect more on the power of a stable, rather than three on their own. It wouldn't be any problem to shuffle the teams since from what I understand it's the losing team who's barred from challenging, not the individual stables from fielding different teams. I see the Typhoon super team getting the nod here, especially since MO'z is such a large stable that they'll have a much easier time finding three different competitors.

Winners: Susumu Yokosuka, Ryo Saito, & Dragon Kid

GHC Jr. Tag Titles: Shingo Takagi & BxB Hulk vs. Taiji Ishimori & KENTA
-KENTA on a Dragon Gate PPV? It's happening and what's even more surprising about it is that he's bringing Taiji Ishimori, yet another Toryumon graduate coming to Dragon Gate. They're mission in coming to Dragon Gate is recapture NOAH's GHC Jr. Heavyweight Tag Team titles and bring them back to the green ring. Shingo and Hulk are going to be a tough team to beat though and they won't go down easy on their home turf. I don't really know if I like the idea of seeing the belts tossed around like this. Speed Muscle held them then dropped them almost immediately to Shingo & Hulk in their second defense. Another loss in an early defense doesn't do much for the belts' standing as a strong title that the title had after it was held by Ricky Marvin & Kotaro Suzuki. I say move the belts to the NOAH team and let KENTA & Ishimori have a long reign.

Winners: KENTA & Taiji Ishimori

Open the Dream Gate: CIMA vs. Masato Yoshino
-Masato Yoshino has been on a major roll since before Speed Muscle started to pick up momentum. He's proven to be a strong performer at the Open the Brave Gate level. He's already beaten CIMA in a Brave Gate match, but does he have what it takes to beat Dragon Gate's ace when the Dream Gate is on the line? CIMA will most likely win, but Yoshino can come out looking like a star and could be set up to become an Open the Dream Gate Champion in the future.

Winner: CIMA

Your Weekly Puro
As I mentioned above, Shuji Kondo disbanded his SUKIYAKI stable in El Dorado over the Naoki Tanisaki drama. So why not find some El Dorado for this week? So I bring you this clash between two old friends from the Italian Connection faction from back in the day. Now former friends battle each other in an epic Japanese indy dream match. For reference, Kondo is the one coming to the ring in the Native American-style gear while YASSHI is the one with dreadlocks.

El Dorado Perfect Treasure: Shuji Kondo vs. brother YASSHI
Part 1


Part 2


Part 3


At Home
So did anything happen this week? Oh right, Jeff Hardy was suspended. Yeah, I was wondering if I had been missing something. I won't lie, it was a real shock to hear about his drug suspension, but I think that there's far too many people who are jumping to condemn him right out. Yes, he fucked up. Badly. I'm more willing to be understanding of someone with past drug problems because it's hard to break the habit and it's entirely too easy to have a moment of weakness. That's not excusing what he did, but it's trying to be a bit more understanding than I've seen some on the message boards be. I also don't think this is the end of his career. I see the WWE being more than willing to give Hardy another chance when he gets back. He's worked hard since his return and he makes the company a lot of money. I can see him coming back and getting back to where he was, but I hope he takes his 60 day suspension and gets clean.

Elevation X. Good god, I hope they never do that match again. Storm and Rhino are two great assets to TNA and to see them doing a scaffolding match is kind of sad. I hope they got paid extra for it, because neither of them looked happy up there (unless they were selling it really well). What I really hated about it was that by doing the match neither of them really gained anything from it. I saw an ad for the PPV talking about the match and neither wrestler was mentioned in it. No one who didn't follow TNA would even know who it was that was risking their lives on top of that thing. Fuck you Elevation X.

That's all for this week folks. I'm tired and I'm running out of time to enjoy the rest of my Spring Break. Peace!