New Japan Cup 2015

[Papa Pillman]

It is entirely possible that they are going to have Makabe win and use this as a way to get the NEVER title back on him

I just can't see that happening, the list of guys that Makabe would have to go through to win the tournament just doesn't seem likely at all. While its not totally out of the realm of possibility, I don't see Makabe or Nagata at their ages winning this tournament. I'd be slightly shocked if the winner didn't come from the group of Tanahashi, Okada, Ibushi, or Shibata. I'd even say Naito or Goto are stronger bids to win it than Makabe.

And if he did win, it would also seem that logically he would take the opportunity to either try and regain the IWGP Heavyweight title, or perhaps to take a shot at the Intercontinental title since it would be the one prize that eludes his resume.

If they want to put the NEVER title back on Makabe, it would appear more likely that they would just GIVE him a match for the belt he had to vacate without losing. That would be more than fair.

 

[ヒュー　G.　レックション]

Shibata and Goto lost the IWGP tag titles back to Anderson and Gallows at New Beginning in Osaka a few days ago.

Styles took the IWGP title off Tanahashi, the Bucks took the jr. tag titles off of reDRagon in a 3-way that also involved the Time Splitters, and Kenny Omega retained the IWGP Jr. title on the same show to allow Bullet Club to dominate the title picture. Throw in Ishii regaining the NEVER title at the Sendai event and Nakamura retaining, and Chaos and Bullet Club now own all of the belts.

So the door is open for Shibata(or even Goto conceivably, though less likely) to win the Cup and challenge for one of the top titles.

Wow, I turn my back for 5 minutes and all of this has happened!? Styles is champ again. Well in that case Shibata could well do it!

 

[zomigosh]

Aside from them getting repetitive, boring, mostly predictable, a lame way of running a story and taking away the majority of the storylines for the sake of a set of brackets, I can't think of anything wrong with them either.

That's one way to look at them, but I look at them more as a way of giving away previews of potential future feuds in a more sport-like manner. They're fun stuff, especially in New Japan. G1 matches could be looked at as mini-epics, they're somewhat short matches that give a taste of how good a match could be without giving the whole match away. Ibushi/Nakamura at G1 Climax 23 was great, but Ibushi/Nakamura at WK9 was phenomenal. I felt no fatigue from already seeing the match to begin with because I wanted more. They're also used as a way to start feuds, like Naito beating AJ Styles at last years G1 to set up their eventual match at WK9.

New Japan is run differently to the WWE, but different doesn't make it worse. In reality, them giving away matches in the G1 or NJ Cup is no different to WWE just throwing together random RAW or PPV matches for the sake of filling the show.