All Japan - The House Baba built

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RedDwarfTechy

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@Jacob Fox @Leo C @RedDwarfTechy etc etc

Major, possibly VERY MAJOR news!

AJPW ARE GOING TO START AIRING ON THE FITE APP.

– The FITE App announced today that they have come to terms with All Japan Pro Wrestling to carry their events via the Fite App. The events will start this weekend with each show priced at $4.99 with unlimited replays included.

It's a pretty vague statement in regards to what will air on it but we can assume that it is just the modern stuff for now since the TV rights for the classical stuff is a minefield.

https://411mania.com/wrestling/various-news-fite-app-ajpw-shows-atsushi-onita-way-us/
Nice!

Would that mean they stop going up on the drive though?
 

Jacob Fox

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That is great! Thanks for letting us know :)
 

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Got an update. It's the current product. But they seem to be starting with the start of the year.

First show to air is one of the new years Korakuen shows from back in January. The deal is with GAORA (A Japanese TV channel) so it's only the shows that air on GAORA that will go up on Fite. AJPW still get money out of the deal since the money gaora gets from fite will be used to buy more shows from ajpw. Ajpw might not get the lion's share of the money but they will get a bigger fee from Gaora now.
 
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All Japan ran Sumo Hall on August 27 and put 6550 people in it. Up from last years 6522. This was their 45th anniversary show (same anniversary that NJPW is celebrating this year as well. NJPW is like 6 months older). It was a 5 and a half hour show that flew by. Felt like a much better put together show than last years and the crowd was lively and invested.

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All Japan Pro-Wrestling “2017 SUMMER EXPLOSION ~ AJPW 45th Anniversary Show”, 8/27/2017 [Sun] 15:00 @ Ryogoku Kokugikan in Tokyo
6,550 Spectators (crowded)

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(0) Dark Match: Yusuke Okada vs. Keiichi Sato (FREE)
Winner: Keiichi (3:04) with a German Suplex Hold.
~ Yusuke came into the match with all guns blazing against the former rookie from All Japan, but Keiichi remained cool and secured the win. Yusuke continued to try and fight following the conclusion of the match.
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(0) Actress Girl’Z Offer Match: Saori Anno & Natsumi Manki vs. Tae Honma & Miyuki Takase
Winner: Anno (6:28) with a Blockbuster Hold on Honma.

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(1) Yohei Nakajima & Fuminori Abe (Sportiva) vs. Takuya Nomura & Yuya Aoki (both BJW)
Winner: Yohei (4:18) following the Tobiushiro mawashigeri on Yuya.
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(2) LAND’S END vs. Multi-Nation Alliance: Ryoji Sai, Masakado & Ishikiri vs. Massimo, Danny Jones & Sam Adonis
Winner: Sai (7:40) following the Nachi no Taki on Jones.
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(3) All Japan 45th Anniversary Tag Match: Dory Funk Jr. & Hiro Saito (FREE) vs. Masanobu Fuchi & The Great Kabuki (FREE)
Winner: Dory (10:16) with a Spinning Toe Hold on Fuchi.
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(4) BANG!TV World Heavyweight Championship Battle Royal: [3rd Champion] Osamu Nishimura vs. [Challengers] Naoshi Sano (Sano-Damashii), Yutaka Yoshie (FREE), Abdullah Kobayashi (BJW), Rikya Fudo (LAND’S END), Kazuhiro Tamura (HEAT-UP), Rey Paloma (DOVE), Carbell Ito, Atsushi Maruyama (FREE), Aizawa #1 (FREE), Dinosaur Takuma (K-DOJO), Kotaro Yoshino (K-DOJO), Mitoshichi Shinose (ASUKA PRO), Akiyori Takizawa (ASUKA PRO), Great Kojika (BJW)
Winner: Nishimura (8:24) via pin-fall on Kojika.

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(5) Caristico vs. El Diamante
Winner: Carastico (8:19) with the La Mistica.



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(6) Asia Tag Championship Match: [101st Champions] Atsushi Aoki & Hikaru Sato vs. [Challengers] Black Tiger VII & TAKA Michinoku
Winner: Black Tiger VII (10:35) with a Ultra High School Class La Magistral on Hikaru.
~ Champions fall on their 3rd title defense. TAKA & BT VII become the 102nd champions.

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(7) Yuma Aoyagi vs. Taichi (Suzuki-gun)
Winner: Taichi (13:19) following the Taichi style Last Ride.
~ Aoyagi suffers yet another singles loss against Taichi, following his appearance in last year’s SUPER J CUP.
~ TAKA and Yoshinobu Kanemaru were also present at ringside.


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(8) All Japan 45th Anniversary Special Tag Match: Jun Akiyama, Takao Omori, Minoru Tanaka (FREE) & Koji Iwamoto vs. Joe Doering, Zeus, The Bodyguard (FREE) & Kotaro Suzuki (FREE)
Winner: Omori (6:13) following an Axe Bomber on Bodyguard.

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(9) World Junior Heavyweight Championship Match: [44th Champion] TAJIRI vs. [Challenger] Ultimo Dragon
Winner: Dragon (15:57) following the Asai DDT.
~ Champion falls on his 1st title defense. Dragon becomes the 45th champion with the brand new designed World Junior belt. Fuchi and Hiro Saito presented the new belt to Dragon.

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(10) World Tag Championship Decision Match: Naoya Nomura & KAI vs. Daisuke Sekimoto & Yuji Okabayashi
Winner: Okabayashi (17:31) with the Golem Splash on Noaya.
~ Strong BJ become the 77th champions.
~ After the match, Akiyama and Omori confronted the new champion.

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(11) Special Single Match: Suwama vs. Satoshi Kojima
Winner: Kojima (11:15) following a Western Lariat.
~ Doering assaulted Suwama before the start of the match. Kojima used the attack to his advantage as he eventually landed the Lariat to secure the win.

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(12) Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship Match: [56th Champion] Shuji Ishikawa vs. [Challenger] Kento Miyahara
Winner: Miyahara (24:39) with the Shutdown German Suplex Hold.
~ Champion falls on his 3rd title defense. Miyahara becomes the 57th champion.
~ Miyahara stated that he did indeed recapture the belt at Ryogoku as he sent out the invitation for yet another match against Ishikawa in the future.
~ Miyahara declared that he will continue to drive All Japan to the top as he thanked all the fans for their continued support.

Also announced at the show was the following:
X for the September shows was announced to be Manabu Soya. Appears a GET WILD reunion may be in the works heading into the World’s Strongest Tag League later in the year.

Keiji Mutoh was announced to be making his return to the All Japan ring on November 19 for a special show in Sapporo.

All Japan are running the Yokohama Cultural Gymnasium on October 21st for a special show celebrating the 25th anniversary of Akiyama and Omori's debut. Looks like they will challenge for the tag titles at this show.

AJPW will be running the Yokohama Cultural Gymnasium again in February, and a show at the Saitama Super Arena Community hall in March. The community hall is a smaller side venue to the much bigger Super Arena. The community hall is 6000 people and the super arena is closer to 35 thousand. So it seems like All Japan are looking at switching up the schedule in 2018. Rather than run one major show in sumo hall (12-14 thousand depending on the setup) per year they seem to be looking at running 2-3 shows per years in venues like the Yokohama Gymnasium (3000 people at full setup) or the Saitama arena. Saitama is definitely an experiment but doing shows in venues the size of Yokohama is definitely doable, especially with business continuing to grow slowly but steadily.

The 2018 Champion Carnival will be a bigger tour than last year. With 3 stops, including the final being in Korakuen.

All Japan will start running a free show at a university each month starting in November. These shows are produced by Kento since they are his brainchild and the idea is to reach out to younger fans and also to recruit trainees at these shows.

The following was announced after the show (either at the press conference or at the shows that have happened since):

Ultimo Dragon defends the junior belt against Billy Ken Kid at a date that has yet to be set. Ultimo is Billy Ken Kid's idol so it will sort of be a master vs student match.

Akiyama defended the TV title against Atsushi Maruyama on the 3rd.

Suwama wants to team up with Shuji Ishikawa as a tag team but Ishikawa has so far refused Suwama's advances. Expect this to build towards the tag league in late November.

Black Tiger 7 and Taka Michinoku have offered Naoya Nomura and Yuma Aoyagi a shot at the All Asia tag titles. A date have yet to be set.

All Japan have two new trainees. One who started earlier in the spring and who hasn't had his name revealed yet, as it is tradition to have it revealed closer to his debut. Which should be around January February, but I'm just basing that on how long it took for Okada to go from starting in the dojo to debuting. The other one is Yuki Tanzaki, who has actually been wrestling for a year on the micro indies, but who did a try out match with All Japan in June and earned himself a spot. He will report to the dojo to start his trainee duties soon.

Up next is the Royal Road tournament which starts on September 12th.

All Japan will also have donation boxes at their shows for Yoshihiro Takayama's medical costs. Takayama, who is a former Triple Crown champion (one of few men who has held the triple crown, GHC and IWGP heavyweight belts) suffered a freak spinal injury taking a sunset flip at a DDT show in April, and has only now regained mobility in his neck. He is still paralyzed from the neck down and his doctors say he will never walk again. So a lot of Japanese wrestlers are rallying around Takayama to help pay for his medical costs and his family's living expenses while he recovers, and All Japan are taking part in that.
 
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Really nice thing they are doing for Takayama.

Lots of title changes at this show! Is that normal at this sort of anniversary event or just coincidental?
 

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Really nice thing they are doing for Takayama.

Lots of title changes at this show! Is that normal at this sort of anniversary event or just coincidental?
Bit of both I would say. The world tag belts were vacated since Lee injured his knee and is out up towards a year. And Nomura came out a fucking star in the match with Strong BJ. He was made as a tag worker, and KAI is a fantastic tag team wrestler and it is impressive how fast they clicked as a team. I would not say not to them tagging long term.

The junior belt could have gone either way but with Ultimo celebrating 30 years in wrestling him winning makes sense when you look at it that way, same with the Asia tags since Taka is celebrating 25 years. And The Pervert Defense Force needed to drop the belts to further the Evolution breaking up angle.

Kento was always winning the belt back at the biggest show of the year.
 
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That is by far the best tag team name I've ever heard. Is there a story behind it?
Hikaru Sato is a confirmed pervert. It was pretty much his gimmick when he worked in DDT (Among other things his ring gear was a sexy maid's dress and cat ears for a while) and all his merch has scantily clad women on it. The Defense force bit comes from when Evolution started showing up dressed as a military unit back in 2015
 

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Hikaru Sato is a confirmed pervert. It was pretty much his gimmick when he worked in DDT (Among other things his ring gear was a sexy maid's dress and cat ears for a while) and all his merch has scantily clad women on it. The Defense force bit comes from when Evolution started showing up dressed as a military unit back in 2015
Well now I almost forgive him for that atrocious haircut.
 

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Suwama won the Royal Road tournament today, defeating Shuji Ishikawa in the finals. This makes Suwama the first man to win the tournament in back to back years. Suwama and Shuji showed each other respect post match and the two teaming up for the upcoming tag tournament in late November seems likely. Question now is when Suwama challenges for the Triple Crown since AJPW has two defenses scheduled in October, one at Korakuen on the 9th, and one at the big Yokohama show on the 21st. The Suwama vs Doering feud doesn't seem over either since Joe has potshotted Suwama at every opportunity this tour and dominated their semifinal match, only for Suwama to sneak the win.

Tajiri is also getting a rematch for the junior belt at Yokohama and Nomura and Aoyagi are challenging for the asia tag belts on November 30
 

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All Japan drew 1301 fans to Korakuen hall today. Great number considering they ran head to head with New Japan at Sumo Hall. A few notes from the show below:

Taiyo Kea made his return to All Japan for the first time since January 2015.

AJPW trainee Yuki Kanzaki will make his debut (technically a re-debut since he had been working minor sub-indies before getting into the dojo) on November 11 in his hometown of Sapporo. There's also yet another new trainee in the dojo now who joined up at the start of the month. That makes it a total of 4 trainees in the school at this time.

Keiji Mutoh will make a return to All Japan on the same November 11 show taking part in a special 8 man tag.

The teams for the 2017 Real World Tag League were also announced and are as follows:
Kento Miyahara & Yoshitatsu,
Suwama & Shuji Ishikawa,
Jun Akiyama & Takao Omori,
Zeus & The Bodyguard,
Joe Doering & Taiyo Kea,
Naoya Nomura & Yuma Aoyagi,
Daisuke Sekimoto & Yuji Okabayashi,
Manabu Soya & Black Tiger VII,
TAJIRI & KAI,
Ryoji Sai & Masakado.

Osamu Nishimura retained the BANG! World TV title (the main belt for Dory Funk's little indy in Florida) over Wales' Danny Jones, and Joe Doering defeated Shuji Ishikawa to earn the right to challenge for the Triple Crown at the big show in the Yokohama gymnasium on the 21st.

In the main event Suwama defeated Kento Miyahara to win the triple crown, cutting Kento's second run with the belt off at the first defense. This marks Suwama's 6th run with the title and thus it gives him the record of most reigns with the title. This match is getting massive hype on the All Japan hashtag on twitter and is being described as All Japan's match of the year, so keep your eyes open for it.

Suwama will now face Joe Doering at Yokohama, and if I'd take a guess I think he drops it to Joe. Which would then set up the next 6 month or so long program for the belt, having the likes of Suwama, Shuji, Zeus and Kento try and take the belt off of the big foreign monster. I'd also wager that Joe drops the belt to whoever wins the Champion Carnival in 2018.

All in all it seems to have been a great show and the hype actually made the AJPW website crash.

The little train that can keeps on chugging along
 
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Didn't see that one coming, gotta be honest
I figured Kento was winning too but it was always a possibility. People seem to think Suwama is done and dusted. Don't count the big guy out.

It's his job to move the belt onto the monster so the ace doesn't have to
 

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Here's the VTR with the remaining October and part of the November cards as well as info on the tag league
 

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I figured Kento was winning too but it was always a possibility. People seem to think Suwama is done and dusted. Don't count the big guy out.

It's his job to move the belt onto the monster so the ace doesn't have to
Oh yeah, it's totally understandable when you think about it, it's just that I started watching AJPW last year and it feels weird to see Kento lose at all.

I really like what they're doing with Kento and Joe. Ever since Doering came back, he faced Miyahara many times but couldn't beat him once, there was even that singles match they had that went like 8 mins and Kento won easily. It's a really cool story. I'm excited for Joe's eventual defense against Kento and Suwama hasn't even dropped the belt yet lol.