Andrew’s Ratings & Analysis: NJPW New Year Dash!! 1.6.2020

NEW YEAR DASH! The official start to the 2020 New Japan storylines and Liger’s retirement ceremony!

I don’t always cover New Year Dash since even though it’s fun to see how the first feuds of the year get started, it’s not always the most entertaining. But between the last minute reveals of the card and Liger’s retirement ceremony, I figured covering it was a good idea this year.

So just like his matches for Wrestle Kingdom, Liger will kick off the show, as to not take too much attention away from the younger guys. A sweet gesture, now I guess we all get a good cry out of our system before the wrestling starts.

Ratings:

• Alex Coughlin, Clark Connors & Karl Fredericks vs Toa Henare, Yota Tsuji & Yuya Uemura: Sexy Karl wins via Half Liontamer @10:40 – ***
• Taiji Ishimori & ELP vs El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs BUSHI & Hiromu Takahashi vs Roppongi 3k (SHO & YOH): Desperado wins via Crucifix Pin @13:30 – *** 1/4
• Guerrillas of Destiny, Bad Luck Fale & Chase Owens vs Kota Ibushi, Hiroshi Tanahashi, David Finlay & Juice Robinson: Ibushi wins via Kamigoye @11:40 – ***
• Shingo Takagi & EVIL vs Tomohiro Ishii & Hirooki Goto: Shingo wins via Last of the Dragon @16:30 – ****
• Suzuki-Gun (Minoru Suzuki, Lance Archer, Zack Sabre Jr & Taichi) vs CHAOS (Will Ospreay, Kazuchika Okada, YOSHI-HASHI & Robbie Eagles): CHAOS wins via DQ @15:25 – *** 1/4
• Tetsuya Naito & SANADA vs KENTA & Jay White: SANADA wins via Japanese Leg Clutch @14:00 – *** 1/2

Analysis:

Jyushin Thunder Liger Retirement Ceremony 
We get a video package to start with highlighting aspects of his career, from his first IWGP Junior Championship match to his last against Taiji Ishimori. Ikari no Jyushin hits, so Liger is in the ring, shortly surrounded by the Seigi-Gun portion the New Japan roster, led out by Hiroshi Tanahashi. Next is Chaos, led by Okada for gift giving and paying respects. Okada popped the crowd and commentary by pulling out his phone and doing a group selfie with Liger. Naoki Sugabayashi, the Vice President presents Liger with flowers after Chaos exits. Harold Meij is next. Liger’s wife and son are next, and the camera zooms in on Tanahashi, yes, Tanahashi is crying. Antonio Inoki has a special video message for Liger, and you hear the crowd murmuring, most likely in shock.

Liger gives a speech, his music hits and he looks to exit, but Okada won’t let him. Everyone gets back in the ring, and the whole group lift up and toss Liger in the air for celebration, just like sports coaches or a winning pitcher. Then Tanahashi urges the music to play again and the crowd to stand and sing. It’s a great moment, especially seeing Tanahashi singing with Liger with a giant grin on his face. IKARI NO JYUSHIN LIGER!!!

Alex Coughlin, Clark Connors & Karl Fredericks vs Toa Henare, Yota Tsuji & Yuya Uemura  –  The Young Lions had to bring the energy since everyone was still recovering from the emotional  retirement ceremony, and this was great. LA Dojo had a lot of good tandem spots, Henare had some big power moments, but these are always fun for the dojo rivalry. Karl messed up his kip-up, but saved it going into his Super Mario Elbow and then tapping out Yuya with the Half Liontamer. Great start to the actual wrestling.

Taiji Ishimori & ELP vs El Desperado & Yoshinobu Kanemaru vs BUSHI & Hiromu Takahashi vs Roppongi 3k (SHO & YOH)  –  ELP mocks Liger, he really likes being a prick. This was an erratic match, fast paced and just generally fun. Multiple near falls, fun signature spots for everyone, and it comes down to BUSHI accidentally misting SHO, when he intended to hit Desperado, so it gave Despy the opening he needed to pick up the win. Getting the pin over the new champions is a statement.

Guerrillas of Destiny, Bad Luck Fale & Chase Owens vs Kota Ibushi, Hiroshi Tanahashi, David Finlay & Juice Robinson  –  Chase offered the Too Sweet to Ibushi, but Ibushi rejected the offer, so Kota caught the ire of Chase Owens. Tanahashi got tagged in and put together some of his classic offense, before we had Bullet Club start spilling out the match to the crowd and causing general disarray. Tons of BizCliz confusion, outside tactics and entertaining spots. But it does seem like Chase is taking Ibushi’s rejection very personally. Ibushi picking up the win over Chase will either add some fuel to this fire or squash it.

-Seems like after their victory, Tanahashi and Ibushi challenge FinJuice for the Heavyweight Tag titles.

Shingo Takagi & EVIL vs Tomohiro Ishii & Hirooki Goto  –  Four tough strong style guys beating the hell out of one another, this was fantastic. EVIL and Ishii seemed to pair off often, throwing haymakers and lariats. Shingo and Goto still have a rubber match necessary, so you had to assume Shingo was going to try and get a shot at the NEVER Openweight title. All four wiped each other out with Lariats, Goto hit a GTR, but EVIL broke up the pin. More huge bombs, Shingo his a Draping version of the GTR, and then Last of the Dragon. Great big strong boi match.

-Shingo makes the challenge for the NEVER Openweight title, and Ishii and EVIL have a few words. Shingo for NEVER champion!

Suzuki-Gun (Minoru Suzuki, Lance Archer, Zack Sabre Jr & Taichi) vs CHAOS (Will Ospreay, Kazuchika Okada, YOSHI-HASHI & Robbie Eagles)  – “If it looks like money, smells like money, it must be Okada”, Rocky Romero 2020 everyone.  Taichi starts off targeting Okada during the typical Suzuki-Gun turmoil. The Holy Emperor and The Rainmaker…sign me up for that. Poor Robbie Eagles bats for the cycle and every member of Suzuki-Gun takes turns torturing him. When Eagles finally gets a tag, it’s to…YOSH-HASHI…oh boy. Sabre and Ospreay have a few moments, Archer and YOSHI do a lot of work together, but Taichi shows Okada his Dangerous side. Taichi hits Okada with the Iron Fingers, and Asami calls for the disqualification.

-During the aftermath, Taichi looks to send another message to Okada, but Moxley’s music hits. Taichi bails, Suzuki and Moxley have a quick back and forth, and builds for their eventual match. Moxley punctuates things with a Death Rider and says “If he fucks with me, he’s fucking dead”. 

Tetsuya Naito & SANADA vs KENTA & Jay White  –  Naito comes out in a new ash grey outfit, like the Phoenix that has risen from the ashes (or that’s how I symbolize it). Naito attacks KENTA pretty quickly, and we get a mostly split match. KENTA and Naito, SANADA and Jay. The crowd hates KENTA. So anyone that thought KENTA’s attack didn’t go over well, was obviously wrong. KENTA go home chants, and KENTA just egging it on wonderfully. Great character work, and SANDA getting a victory over Jay White is great for him. It gives SANADA some momentum and a story for the first part of 2020, and Bullet Club loses, while not looking bad.

-KENTA and Jay beat down SANADA and Naito, take the microphone and berate the crowd. KENTA seems to love the hatred, and as he gives his promo, he literally steps on and walks over Naito.

Overall Score: 8/10

This was a mystery card coming in, but damn was it great. Starting off with the emotional moment of Liger’s Retirement ceremony, and all of the new feuds that got started through the tag matches.

Ibushi and Tanahashi going for the tag titles, Shingo head hunting for the NEVER, Moxley giving a little back to Suzuki, and Naito’s new angle with KENTA was beautiful. This new version of KENTA has the cocky swagger he started finding in 205 Live, mixed with the callousness and devastating strikes of his NOAH era.

The fact that most fans probably went from emotional but in a happy way, to irate at the Bullet Club, all over the course of one wrestling show; that’s pretty special. New Year’s Dash did exactly what it was supposed to do. It set up stories for the first few months at least and gave us some fun wrinkles.