The Navigation Log 4.27.08: Global Tag League Finals

Posted by Matt Short on 04.27.2008

The final week of the Global Tag League is behind us and I'm previewing the final matches from the Budokan show. Also, Dragon Gate is on the brink of all hell breaking loose among its factions with two titles to be decided this weekend. Suwama gets his shot at the Triple Crown, Yuji Nagata chooses his return match opponent, and JAPANESE MULLETS.

Graduation looms. Not for me though, I've got another few months of school thanks to the royal fuck ups inflicted on me by studying abroad in 2007. Though after looking at the school's plans for graduation, I'm glad I'm not going to have to sit through that. Nothing is more boring that a graduation ceremony, especially if you're on the receiving end of the diploma. I can only assume that people have gotten through these ceremonies by drinking themselves into a stupor in the past.

So onto the Navigation Log already!

Global Tag League: Final Week
NOAH's Global Tag League is set to wrap up on Sunday, and by the time most people get up to read this, we'll have a winner at which time I'll edit in the final results. So let's take a look at this past week and see where the points fall heading into the Budokan finals.

4/20
For those who don't know about 4/20 this year, it is the birthday of a very very special person who is influential to billions of people. I am speaking of course about Hanuman, a servant of Rama, the avatar of Hindu god Vishnu.

Anyway, this show turned out to be a big night in Osaka for the Tag League. Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio got a big win over Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa to tie them up for the lead with 9 points. Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone started a comeback of sorts by defeating Bison Smith & Akitoshi Saito. Lastly, the GHC Heavyweight Tag Team champions Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura got a win over a team that had been proven to be a real threat in Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano.

4/22
Takayama & Sano continued to slide as they lost to D-Lo Brown & Buchanan.

4/23
Another big night, this time in the city of Nagoya with three League matches. Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki were able to fight Smith & Saito to a draw, but the single point for them put Smith & Saito within striking distance of winning the top. Misawa & Ogawa continued their streak by beating Takayama & Sano, effectively putting the dark horse team completely out of the running for winning the tournament. Morishima & Yone also continued their streak with a win over Brown & Buchanan. This also put them within the upper end of the standings and gave them a good chance heading into the Budokan show.

4/25
Last stop before the Budokan. Misawa & Ogawa picked up a win over Taue & Shiozaki, cementing them as a major threat to win on the following night. Brown & Buchanan won over Marufuji & Sugiura also seemingly putting the champs out of the running for winning the whole thing.

So final points heading into Sunday's Budokan Hall show look like this:
Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio: 9 points
Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa: 9 points
Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone: 8 points
Bison Smith & Akitoshi Saito: 8 points
D-Lo Brown & Buchanan: 8 points
Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura: 7 points
Yoshihiro Takayama & Takuma Sano: 6 points
Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima: 6 points
Akira Taue & Go Shiozaki: 4 points

There will be three final matches of the Global Tag League at the Budokan Hall on Sunday. They will be:

-Takeshi Morishima & Mohammad Yone (8) vs. Naomichi Marufuji & Takashi Sugiura (7)
-Jun Akiyama & Takeshi Rikio (9) vs. Kensuke Sasaki & Katsuhiko Nakajima (6)
-Mitsuharu Misawa & Yoshinari Ogawa (9) vs. Bison Smith & Akitoshi Saito (8)

It's going to be very interesting to see how this plays out in the end. Marufuji & Sugiura and Sasaki & Nakajima both don't have any chance to win. The champs won't even be able to force a draw with anyone if they win. There are three chances for a playoff: If Akiyama & Rikio or Misawa & Ogawa go to draws in their matches and Morishima & Yone win there will be a final match. We'll get a similar scenario if Morishima & Yone and Smith & Saito both win. And finally, If Akiyama & Rikio and Misawa & Ogawa both win the finals will be between them.

It's 50/50 at this point. A tie breaker would be pretty exciting, especially if they could work it out to be Morishima & Yone vs. Misawa & Ogawa. That would be my preferred final, just to play off the last match between these two that didn't have a conclusive finish at all. In that case I would have the Morishima & Yone win. Otherwise, I want Akiyama & Rikio to win. They have turned out to be a lot of fun as a tag team, which many people didn't expect. Their last run as champions was cut off due to an injury to Rikio and winning this tournament would be perfect for putting them right back in the hunt for the belts.

Dragon Gate: Revolution Time?
This is going to be a critical weekend in Dragon Gate. Not only is the tournament for the new Open the Brave Gate champion underway, but CIMA will defend the Open the Dream Gate title against fellow Typhoon member Ryo Saito. This could be a major turning point for all the factions.

First, the Brave Gate tournament opened with some interesting developments. El Blazer defeated Genki Horiguchi while Gamma cheated to defeat Typhoon's British connection, PAC. The returning Naoki Tanisaki beat Super Shisa and in a rematch Anthony W. Mori cleanly beat Masato Yoshino. This show also saw the leader of the Muscle Outlaw'z, Naruki Doi, being ignored by the rest of his stable in a tag match. Signs of trouble are mounting for MO'z.

The semi-finals for the Brave Gate tournament look like this:
-El Blazer vs. Gamma
-Naoki Tanisaki vs. Anthony W. Mori

I'd put Gamma as the favorite to win this. Hi ruthless cheating led him to victory during the King of Gate tournament and I'd expect nothing less from him here. Mori is suddenly a believable threat though. He's twice beaten Yoshino and is on a big roll at the moment. Tanisaki is also looking good and making the finals would legitimize his return to Dragon Gate a bit. El Blazer? I can't see him winning at all really. Not unless he was going to start taking a lot more Dragon Gate bookings or even become a full time member of the roster.

The CIMA vs. Saito Dream Gate title match will be the other big thing to watch. Saito has been getting very heelish and a turn seems almost inevitable. The question is will it happen now? If they pull the trigger on a title switch, there will be a lot of focus on Saito and he would be perfect to lead the new stable that seems to be forming. However, he's also still got an Open the Twin Gate title shot with Susumu Yokosuka coming up in may. The full turn will probably wait until there. Or Susumu could turn with him, though I don't like the idea of Yokosuka going heel now.

News Elsewhere
Still trying to find time to fully cover All Japan and New Japan, but here's some brief bits of news.

All Japan: Kensuke Sasaki vs. Suwama for the Triple Crown has been set for next Tuesday. Suwama earned his shot by winning the Champion's Carnival and is looking to make his name as a major player in Japanese wrestling by beating the title. Sasaki has said he's not ready to part with the belt yet and made this clear by apparently stiffing the hell out of Suwama during at tag match.

Also Taiyo Kei and Minoru Suzuki have agreed to form their own unit together after Kei rejected an offer to join All Japan's super heel stable, Voodoo Murders. All is not perfect between Kei and Suzuki as they were reportedly arguing about who was the leader backstage.

New Japan: I'm sure I'm completely behind on this, but New Japan has been facing off with ZERO1-MAX over the past week in Do or Die Matches. New Japan seems to have won every outing thus far except one where Masato Tanaka competed and won for his team. Other than that it seems fine for ZERO1 guys to lose as long as it's Tatsuhito Takaiwa and that's mainly because no one likes him.

Yuji Nagata's return from his recent health crisis is set. He'll continue the New Japan vs. ZERO1 feud teaming with Manabu Nakanishi & Koji Kanemoto against his handpicked opponent Masato Tanaka who will team with Ryouji Sai & Ikuto Hidaka.

Weekly Puro
I've been watching Big Japan this week just because I was in the mood for some hardcore and wanted to give this little promotion a chance. And I very nearly picked a panes of glass deathmatch of Jun Kasai vs. Mammoth Sasaki just on the off chance it would piss people off. Because it sure made me mad. But technically, it wasn't for Big Japan so it was out. Instead, I've selected a nice little number featuring indy strongman Daisuke Sekimoto challenging Sasaki for the WEW Heavyweight Championship. Mammoth Sasaki kinda sucks in my opinion, but I really enjoyed watching this match. Maybe it's the mullet, but Sekimoto reminds me a bit of "The Gladiator" Mike Awesome.

BJW WEW Heavyweight Title Mammoth Sasaki © vs. Daisuke Sekimoto






At Home
I wanted to have a nice, long chat about the subject of race in professional wrestling after hearing about the Michael Hayes suspension. But there's really not much that feel like I can comment on other than racist shit annoys the hell out of me and I'm glad the WWE put their foot down. At the same time, I know that it's not going to be the end of the problems wrestling has faced like… forever. Even if racial slurs aren't going to be tolerated, you've still got your stereotype characters. Umaga, as awesome as Jamal plays the character, is one. Kofi Kingston? At least he's not portrayed as lazy and getting high every chance he gets. Then there's the myriad of other horrible gimmicks from the past that are at least a million times worse. In a way wrestling thrives off of racism. Who always make the best villains? Foreigners. That's true in every country of the world from the United States to Japan and Mexico. I don't know what the best way to deal with it is, but I think the fact that the Hayes suspension has sparked a conversation on the issue and maybe things can be sorted out. Not in our lifetimes though.

Here's something not depressing though! BACKLASH is tonight. I want to believe Matt Hardy will beat MVP for the US Title, but I think the WWE will want to drag that out a little longer. If the match comes off really, really, REALLY well then they definitely will do it. Even if Hardy wins, there will be a rematch. I'm not overly interested in the rest of the card though. I kind of want to see where they go with the HBK/Batista/Jericho thing. It should be interesting mainly because there's so many different ways this could turn out.

Short Takes
-In the picture of him sitting on the throne Regal really reminds me of Alex from A Clockwork Orange. They need to run a segment of him beating the crap out of Hornswoggle in the back singing "Singing in the Rain."

-Jarrod Westerfeld wanted me to give my thoughts on if New Japan should have put their title on Jushin Liger last week. In truth, I don't think he should be the guy leading the company. They're having great success with their younger generation stars and in truth, Liger should be used as more of an attraction anyway. Now, if it's come down to a backstage thing, I wouldn't know anything about it since reading Japanese dirt sheets is impossible. Either way, Liger should not be IWGP Heavyweight champ.

-Though I like ROH a lot, I can't help but laugh at people who are accusing the company of become too "sportz entertainment-y." Are they dumb or just turning a blind eye to maybe The Embassy? Uh ROH vs. CZW? It's always been like this, but whenever something new comes up as the start of a storyline (in this case Aries/Jacobs/Lacey) they get upset.

-I'll revise my statement from before and say Mammoth Sasaki really sucks. It's not the Sekimoto match that convinces me of this, but rather the deathmatch with Jun Kasai. Don't believe me? Look it up on YouTube.

That's all for this week. I'll probably update this post later in the day with the Dragon Gate and NOAH results and do full coverage of them next week. So until then, peace!