The Navigation Log 4.06.08: Tournament Season

Posted by Matt Short on 04.06.2008

The Global Tag League rolls on and we take a look at the opening matches of All Japan's Champion's Carnival. Also some WrestleMania thoughts.

So did anything happen last week? I heard that Punk and Jericho had a good match on Raw. And Cryme Time is back! Man, what an eventful week! Wait…

I'm being told that joke isn't funny and anyone wrestling fan with 1/10th of a brain knows why Monday was huge. Ric Flair's farewell address was not just good TV, but it was probably the greatest moment I've seen on a professional wrestling program. Period. People might have other favorite moments, but that was historic. Ric Flair will never wrestle again and the WWE made sure that his final appearance would be memorable.

From this week on I'll try to incorporate news and events from New Japan and All Japan when there's news to mention. I'm not as up-to-date with their doings but none the less, onto the Navigation Log!

NOAH - Global Tag League
After the two initial matches reported on last week, the Global Tag League is in full swing. And the way things stand now this tournament has a pretty open field. Let's take it day by day:

3/30
After losing in their first match, D-Lo Brown & Buchanan bounced back with a big win over the team of Bison Smith & Akitoshi Saito. Meanwhile the team that defeated RO&D on the first night, Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima continued to look strong but ran into a road bump. Their match with the GHC Heavyweight Tag Team champions Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura went to a draw after 30 minutes. Not a very auspicious start for the champions in the tournament, but they managed to avoid the loss to the very dangerous Kensuke Office team.

3/31
Sasaki & Nakajima continued to slide as they lost their match to Smith & Saito. They managed to isolate the smaller man, Nakajima, and put him away with a Sickle of Death from Saito. A surprising win for them as they're not exactly a team I would have expected to go over the visiting team.

4/1
Both matches on this night ended in shockers. First, Brown & Buchanan went over Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa in just over 2 minutes. That's the official time listed on NOAH's Japanese site as well as the English site. I don't know if it was an April Fool's joke or what, but that was a big shock. The other upset was Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano beating Sasaki & Nakajima. It might not be that great of a surprise as Takayama & Sano were picked by many to be a dark horse team, but I don't think anyone expected them to come out as strong as they did here.

4/4
The Kensuke Office team got right back into it with a win over Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki. Sasaki pinned Shiozaki from a Northern Lights bomb and all seemed about right with the world. Shiozaki had been the job boy in the last tag team tournament as he lost every single match for him and Taue. But…

4/5
Shiozaki was not going to be shut out this time around. He and Taue defeated Brown & Buchanan when Shiozaki surprised Buchanan with a cradle pin. Hey, looks like NOAH's finally looking to give the guy a mild push! Okay, not getting my hopes up. Elsewhere Smith & Saito defeated Takayama & Sano. Last, but not least Marufuji & Sugiura fought Misawa & Ogawa to a draw. The champs have so far gotten two draws, but Misawa & Ogawa have yet to win at all. I won't expect them to be completely shut out in this tournament, but its surprising that they've been shut out.

So far the standings look a little something like this:

Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima: 5
Bison Smith & Akitoshi Saito: 4
D-Lo Brown & Buchanan: 4
Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano: 2
Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki: 2
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio: 2
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura: 2
Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa: 2
Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone: 0

So despite coming up short in a couple matches, Sasaki & Nakajima are still on top. They have three more matches to go through so they will have a chance to extend their lead. Saito & Smith still have five matches left while RO&D has three. All the other teams have more than enough time to try and accumulate more points. The team to watch is going to be Morishima & Yone. Even though they dropped their first match they have a full schedule remaining and if they build up momentum with a few wins could run through the rest of the tournament. Stay tuned!

All Japan Champions Carnival
While the Global Tag League is the biggest thing going on in NOAH right now, the All Japan Champion's Carnival is easily the biggest event in Japan right now. This prestigious tournament has started in 1973 and despite a hiatus during the 80's has been a staple of Japanese pro wrestling. The list of men who have won is a who's who of puro legends: Giant Baba, Jumbo Tsutura, Stan Hansen, Vader, Kenta Kobashi, and Mitsuharu Misawa are just a few of the names who have won this tournament. Like many events of its nature in Japan, The Champion's Carnival is held with round robin rules: two points for a win, 1 point for a time limit draw, and 0 points for a loss or any other type of draw. All Japan has been boasting that this year's tournament is one of the biggest and the line-up certainly shows:

Block A
Satoshi Kojima
Keiji Mutoh
Hiroshi Tanahashi (New Japan)
Toshiaki Kawada
Taiyo Kea

Block B
Joe Doering
Osamu Nishimura
Kensuke Sasaki (Triple Crown Champion)
Suwama
Minoru Suzuki

It's hard for me to really pick a favorite in this one. As I've said before, I'm not completely up to date on where things are going in All Japan right now. The Champion's Carnival is mainly meant to establish a challenger for The Triple Crown though the current champion has won the tournament in the past. A lot of the attention it's getting this year is from IWGP Heavyweight Champion Hiroshi Tanahashi competing in it, leaving the door open for a possible champion vs. champion final. (NOTE: I have thusly been informed that Tanahashi is not the IWGP champion anymore. I brain farted and completely forgot about the whole Shinsuke Nakamura/Kurt Angle match. Thus, this can be a potential match for the finals. My apologies for the mix-up.)

The tournament just got under way and is going to continue through the rest of the week. So far there have been some surprises from the first day. From Block A, Mutoh defeated Kea and Satoshi Kojima beat Toshiaki Kawada. In Block B Nishimura and Sasaki went to a 30 minute draw that has gotten good reports. The biggest upset though was Joe Doering going over Minoru Suzuki. Doering has been getting pushed in All Japan, but this was still a massive upset. So after the first day the Champion's Carnival standings look like this:

Block A
Keiji Mutoh: 2 points
Satoshi Kojima: 2 points
Toshiaki Kawada: 0 points
Taiyo Kea: 0 points
Hiroshi Tanahashi: 0 points

Block B
Joe Doering: 2 points
Kensuke Sasaki: 1 point
Osamu Nishimura: 1 point
Suwama: 0 points
Minoru Suzuki: 0 points

I really can't pick a winner in this to be honest. A Tanahashi vs. Sasaki final would be huge, but I can't imagine New Japan or All Japan wanting their champion to lose. Unless this is going to turn into a great partnership between the two companies I don't think we'll see it. I do think Tanahashi will make it to the final though. He might even win it unless someone like Suwama or Doering ends up getting a huge push in Block B.

At Home
This was a fine week for wrestling. WrestleMania XXIV was really good and while the show had some down points it was probably the best WrestleMania that's been put on in ages. The big story was of course Ric Flair's final match which went above and beyond expectations. I know there are people who aren't happy about the moonsault press that Michaels "missed" but even that wasn't bad. I've seen bigger whiffs from guys less talented than HBK that didn't get half the amount of complaining people have over that spot. A trillion stars for that match. Everything else was great, barring the Batista/Umaga and BunnyMania matches. Can't get too worked up about BunnyMania, unless you think about they fact that there used to be legitimate Women's Title matches on WrestleMania in the past and it's on of the few things TNA has done right (which is amazing). Batista/Umaga was just disappointing. You'd think they could have done something more than… that. It's disappointing just on the grounds that it could have been something so much more. The biggest surprise was the Belfast Brawl that opened the show. People expected it to be good, but I think some had their doubts. Money in the Bank also came off well, though the Ladder Match has lost a lot of its luster to be honest. There were some new spots, but the idea of just throwing a bunch of guys together and having them fall off of stuff (while all well and good) leave you wanting just a bit more. I still say those type of matches would work better with fewer guys in them. You take out Carlito and MVP (MVP can defend the US Title) and you'd still have had a pretty solid match.

And hey Lockdown is shaping up to be a cool little PPV. TNA seems to be trying really hard to fix the problems it's had in the past. I approve on the simple grounds that better booking on TNA's part leads to a better product and better wrestling to watch. Does anyone have a problem with that? Why would you, unless you're a militant WWE fan.

Short Takes
-Dragon Gate came off strong at ROH again last weekend. I'm still curious about how much DG storylines played in the event, particularly the main event since the Video Wire showed CIMA, Dragon Kid, Naruki Doi, and Masato Yoshino raising each others hands.

-The tag action on Raw this week was fun to see. But I'm not getting my hopes up over a tag team revival based on that. Hell, if there was going to be a revival it would have been after the Ladder Match from Armageddon 2006. Or the Hardy Boys/Cade & Murdoch series. What makes this time any different?

-I got an email this week from Hawaiian wrestler AkUa. It was a one line email thanking me for my compliments to him for his work at King of Trios. It was very cool getting an email from someone in the business who is reading my stuff.

That's all for this week. We'll do results from the Global Tag League and a wrap-up of the Champion's Carnival next time. Until then, peace!