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READ PART TWO HERE: BEGINNERS GUIDE TO FOLLOWING NEW JAPAN (pt. 2): An introduction to the faction landscape and an overview of each faction including leaders and members and dynamic
Now stop me if you’ve heard this one: A wrestling promotion has too many championships. It seems to be a common ailment in the world of professional wrestling right now, and New Japan Pro Wrestling is far from immune to that ailment.
In prior years those championships were attached to divisions, some explicit and some implied. Much of that distinction has faded in recent years. Somewhat incredibly, the situation was worse about six years ago when major NJPW events would see a card of ten title matches. Promotions such as Ring of Honor and Revolution Pro Wrestling had title defenses on Wrestle Kingdom. In all fairness, there has been something of an effort in the last 18 months to cut back a little on the championships that are defended on NJPW shows.
To continue our primer series on the promotion, we’ll talk about the current champions and contenders for each of the Japan-based championships. Why the qualifier? New Japan has an American “arm” which has titles associated with it. As of this year, those titles are only defended in the United States. There are only three of them right now: The Strong Openweight Championship (held by Tomohiro Ishii), the Strong Openweight Tag Team Championship (held by Jorel Nelson and Royce Isaacs, the World Class Wrecking Crew), and the Strong Women’s Championship (held by Mercedes Moné).
IWGP World Heavyweight Championship
Holder: Hirooki Goto
Top contenders: Zack Sabre Jr, Shingo Takagi, David Finlay, Shota Umino,
The fact that I could only come up with four top contenders to the top championship in the promotion is an indication of how hard-hit NJPW has been by the roster defections. More to the point, a couple of those names feel like stretches who have already lost to the reigning champion.
Goto beat Zack Sabre Jr. in February for the title to end an 18-year story of being the bridesmaid. Until that win, Goto was the only person who had won the G1 Climax but never won the world title. He won the New Japan Cup three times, and made the finals in 2024. He is a massive fan favorite who has won every title he could have won in the promotion. He’s a contemporary of Katsuyori Shibata and Shinsuke Nakamura, but his style is more of a blend of impact moves and strong strikes.
ZSJ also fell under that bridesmaid designation. He won the New Japan Cup twice, but failed to win the IWGP World Title. He always seemed to hit a glass ceiling that is very specific to New Japan – the unwillingness to have too many of their top names as foreigners.
With Kenny Omega, Will Ospreay, and Jay White all laying claim to that spot for most of the last six years, ZSJ was relegated to the tag team division and to being a “dangerous contender” in tournaments. That changed with the talent exodus, and ZSJ won the G1 in 2024 and then broke with tradition to challenge and beat Tetsuya Naito before Wrestle Kingdom. ZSJ went on to become the first foreign wrestler to defend a championship at Wrestle Kingdom, which he did on back-to-back nights. He is the top contender right now, having beaten David Finlay at Windy City Riot and issued a challenge to Goto at the end of Wrestling Dontaku Night 2.
Shingo Takagi also issued a challenge after Wrestling Dontaku, but he was happy to settle for the winner of the ZSJ-Goto match. It’s hard to know how to take this return to the top of the card for Shingo, who is a former IWGP World Champion but has spent the time since that reign just floating near the top of the mid-card. He’s held the Never Openweight title five times, the now-defunct KOPW title once, and was even a Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Champion.
Since losing the world title in 2022 to Kazuchika Okada, he has not been considered a threat for that championship. His matches are always excellent, his crowd support has never wavered, but for some reason he has not gone to the top again. As part of the same stable as the even-more-popular Tetsuya Naito, it’s possible that he was “stuck in line” behind Naito and therefore could not ascend. Now that Naito is gone, Shingo is getting his chance to compete for the title… but history tells me it won’t be successful.
For his part, Finlay won the New Japan Cup in 2025 but lost his title match to Goto. He is currently embroiled in a bitter feud with Evil and House of Torture, which was supposed to culminate in a rare steel cage match between their factions. The end of that match seems to be suggesting that Finlay and Evil have one more match to go, so he’s still not freed up for the title picture. In addition, Finlay’s future was the subject of some conjecture at time of writing. If he does stick around he has some history with Goto, but he’s at best third on the waiting list now.
Shota Umino is a bit of a puzzling one. He is one of the much-vaunted new generation (along with Yota Tsuji, Ren Narita, Yuya Uemura, Kosei Fujita, and Ryohei Oiwa), and certainly seemed to be the one pegged for the most success by NJPW brass. Like everyone else from that generation, he has had multiple title shots and lost them all. Two of those were for the IWGP World Title, including at Wrestle Kingdom 2025 against ZSJ and at Windy City Riot 2025 where he lost to Goto. The fans have largely declined to get behind him, sometimes resorting to openly rebelling and booing him. It would be hard to see him getting another shot so soon, but there is nobody else on the horizon.
To be fair, we are about to spend a month or so on Best of the Super Juniors. It’s highly unlikely Goto would be defending on any of those cards, and he might not even be booked on them. He most recently defended the title against Callum Newman in a match that did wonders to elevate Newman as a star. There is still time to develop a plan for the next contender, but it will require a good amount of work.
IWGP Global Heavyweight championship
Holder: Yota Tsuji
Top contenders: Yuya Uemura, Evil, Gabe Kidd, Ryohei Oiwa
The Global Heavyweight Title is the de facto secondary title in the company, despite only existing since 2023. It replaced the United States Championship, which became the secondary title by default when the Intercontinental Title was absorbed into the IWGP World Title.
Tsuji was the first of the new generation to return from excursion, and immediately challenged for the world title. He was not successful, but he had undeniable charisma and a look that set him apart from most of the roster. While he was not the first of that group to win a title (Narita won the six-man title first) or even the first to win a singles title (Uemura won the now-defunct King of Pro Wrestling championship), he is the first and so far only one to win one of the major titles. He won the title from David Finlay at Wrestle Kingdom in January, but since then has only defended against Jack Perry, Gabe Kidd (which ended in a double knockout), and Evil.
The title picture here is interesting, as Tsuji has just successfully defended against Uemura. Those two had a strong feud over the KOPW Title that touched on their histories as Young Lions, and also resulted in Uemura being forced to shave his head. Uemura’s loss has an outside shot of propelling him up the card, but I think it’s a little too early for that. He missed several months due to injury and although his return has been well received he is not quite ready to be the potential face of the company. His feud with Tsuji has more meat on the bone, with a history of over 50 matches (and 22 draws) between them.
Evil has a similar problem, though for him it is not a case of readiness but rather palatability. His House of Torture faction is often touted as one of the biggest irritants with the promotion, and having him as the main champion would be a massive risk. Much of the distaste for the antics of HoT are down to the way the members interfere in matches. Evil’s character and in-ring ability are not the problem. He is a former world champion, and a short title run for him with this belt would do wonders for whoever takes it away from him.
Which brings me to Gabe Kidd. I think Kidd is beautifully positioned to be Global champion very soon. Tsuji did not beat him, so there’s a natural rematch waiting there. Should Evil manage to win the title, there’s established animosity with Kidd and Evil. He also recently lost his Strong Openweight Title, freeing him up to go after something else. Kidd is a star waiting to happen, only lacking in a second dimension to his in-ring style.
Rarely does New Japan allow people to jump multiple tiers at once, which would suggest that Kidd needs to pursue the Global Championship before moving up. At the time Kidd and Tsuji faced off for the title, neither man could afford a loss. Kidd had just lost an emotional and incredible match at WrestleKingdom to Kenny Omega, and Tsuji had just won the title. Now Tsuji can take that loss, while Kidd really needs a win. The challenge was issued at Wrestling Dontaku, and in my mind it leads to a title change.
Oiwa is a bit of a dark horse here, as he only recently came back from excursion and is still finding his place. The thing is, he doesn’t really fit anywhere else on the card right now and he has some mouthwatering potential matches with the other names on this list.
ARTICLE CONTINUED BELOW…
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Never Openweight Championship
Holder: Konosuke Takeshita
Top contenders: Shingo Takagi, Boltin Oleg, Drilla Moloney, Henare
It is hard to describe this championship division in terms that relate to anything in North America. I think the closest we can get is TNA’s X-Division – both heavyweights and junior heavyweights can compete for the title, and the matches are very much focused on the in-ring action. Where it differs is that those matches tend to be extremely physical. I have affectionately called it the “head bumps and hard lumps” division. It’s often referred to as the BMF title, an initialism that I shall decline to spell out for fear of angering the editors.
If you have watched AEW, you know all about Takeshita. Hard though this might be to fathom, he might be even more spectacular in a New Japan ring. He has carried greener opponents like Oleg to tremendous matches, despite the fact that Takeshita himself is not yet 30 years old. This division is perfectly suited for his style, and everything he does makes me glad I no longer wrestle. He will eventually drop the title to a wrestler who only works for NJPW, and he’s looked so utterly untouchable that whoever that person is will be instantly elevated.
Shingo Takagi is always in contention for this championship because he has become synonymous with it. He’s had brutal slugfests with everyone on this list, along with Ishii and Taichi who are just floating below the top-level threats to the title. It could be reasonably argued that Shingo would be at home at the top of the card chasing the main title, but for some reason there had been no taste (whether in management or from Shingo himself) to make that happen. So he continues to slug fools with elbows and drop them on their heads, and when we aren’t cringing from the impact we are on the edge of our seats. Should he lose his upcoming world title match, I would not be surprised to see him come right back to this division.
Boltin Oleg is a project. He’s got a tremendous freestyle wrestling background, he’s obscenely strong, and he’s built a good following in a relatively short time. He is still mastering his craft, having come through the Young Lion system but not actually going on excursion as is tradition. It feels like too big of a leap for the time being, but I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that he’s a strong candidate to eventually unseat Takeshita.
Drilla Moloney has only recently moved up to heavyweight, but he already has a win over Shingo and looks right at home with the big boys. His booking early on in this singles run has been too heavily focused on his finisher being the most dangerous move in the promotion. To be fair, nobody has kicked out of it yet, which is a rarity in New Japan. Once he develops a little more depth to his character, this division feels like a solid home for him and his smashmouth style. I would greatly enjoy watching him and Takeshita, a match that has never happened but really, really needs to.
Henare is currently injured, but much like Shingo he is tailor-made for the Never Openweight Division. Unlike Shingo, he only has one way of wrestling… and he tends to drag his opponents into that style with him. That’s only a slight criticism, since that style is both popular in Japan and perfect for the division. It has however resulted in some pretty nasty injuries for Henare, so with any luck he will dial it back a little on his return.
NJPW World Television Championship
Champion: El Phantasmo
Top contenders: Great-O-Khan, TJP, Ren Narita
The TV Title actually has a unique restriction: All matches for it have a 15-minute time limit. In North American terms that is not much of a restriction, but in Japan the average length of a match is quite a bit higher. Championship matches tend to be longer still, so making sure these matches are 15 minutes at most give you a perfect opening match for a big card. They tend to be high-paced densely-packed affairs.
El Phantasmo is another wrestler who has deserved a title run for his hard work. The TV Title was his first heavyweight championship, and came right on the back of his return from cancer treatment. He’s got a great mind for the business and would make a great trainer when he is ready to move away from the ring. He also has a great connection with the fans, and can work with most styles at high pace; he makes an excellent early-card talent because of that, and having a championship to match that role makes sense.
He recently regained the title from O-Khan who had beaten him for it only a couple of weeks prior, a strange sequence that only makes sense if it was done to avoid having O-Khan as a double champion. I do think the title is better off being held by a face or a cowardly heel, and ELP can play either role as needed.
That O-Khan title win felt like something of a make-good for all the turmoil in United Empire recently. For a while he was one of the most popular wrestlers on the roster, but New Japan never did anything to capitalize on that and it went nowhere. For most of the last two years, he has alternated between the tag division and the KOPW championship, which was often treated as a joke. His win over El Phantasmo for the title was by countout, and came about after a decidedly heelish turn of events from O-Khan and TJP a couple of weeks prior. That short reign, even if it was done to avoid a double champion, kind of fits with the unfortunate trajectory of O-Khan’s recent career. He does hold a victory over Shota Umino, which was the catalyst for Umino’s transformation into the current cold-faced version, but even that did not last long as Umino beat him in the New Japan Cup.
TJP is the leader of the same stable that O-Khan is in, and as we discussed in my Stables primer that would normally mean a title shot for the time being is unlikely to happen. That may well be true, but recently there has been a very public social media blowup between TJP (and his wife) and former stablemate Jeff Cobb. That has aired a lot of dirty laundry and makes me wonder if we might see TJP going rogue and challenging O-Khan. He’s only recently started competing with heavyweights, but he has not looked out of place. The same online fight could see him being totally de-emphasised though, so this is more a speculative pick than anything.
Ren Narita does not have a whole lot going on right now. His star really has plummeted, coming back from excursion with a whole lot of hype behind him and then joining House of Torture and becoming essentially a background character who even physically looks like his stablemate Sho. He is very talented in the ring when he’s actually allowed to wrestle, and this division would be a great way to remind people of that. There’s also some real comedy potential with the faction acting like his championship is the most important thing on the planet, and he fits the “cowardly heel who runs away as the time limit approaches” role to a tee.
IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship
Holder: El Desperado
Top contenders: Douki, Taiji Ishimori, Hiromu Takahashi, Master Wato, Kosei Fujita
As we mentioned before, the Junior Division is weight-based, not age-based as you might expect from the name. The weight limit is 100 kilos, or 220 pounds. The matches tend to follow the same formula as you would expect from cruiserweights around the world.
El Desperado is one of those wrestlers who manages to have good matches with everyone despite not really having that wow factor. It took a while for me to appreciate just how good he actually is. He’s a bit of a chameleon, defaulting to a submission style but able to adapt to whatever the match needs.
He won the title from Douki in an unfortunate situation when Douki badly injured himself on a dive from the ring to the floor. This is his fifth reign as champ, having organically risen up the ranks from a tag team guy to the star of the division. He’s beaten Francesco Akira, Clark Connors, Kosei Fujita, Taiji Ishimori, and Templario already in this run, with the Best of the Super Juniors tournament on the horizon. Not only does the winner of that tournament get a title shot, but anyone who beats Desperado during the event is likely to earn one as well.
Douki is still injured, but when he does come back you have to imagine he will get an immediate title shot as his reign was cut short due to injury. Even more than Desperado, Douki’s rise was fan-driven and organic. He was brought in as a designated pin-taker for the now-defunct Suzuki-Gun faction (led by Minoru Suzuki, and of which El Desperado was a part), but quickly grew in popularity. His reign was just under six months at the time of his injury. He trained extensively in Mexico, and his style borrows fairly heavily from the luchador tradition, but he has adapted it to be more grounded and to incorporate a more physical aspect for Japanese audiences. Depending on his recovery, I expect he will be challenging the champion in the next couple of months.
Ishimori is a perennial contender. He has a tremendous physique, looks half his age, and moves like it too. His history in Japanese wrestling is frankly hard to believe: he has teamed with Hiroshi Tanahashi, Kenta, Ultimo Dragon and Naomichi Marufuji while competing against the likes of Shinsuke Nakamura, Jado, Gedo, Bryan Danielson, and Go Shiozaki. He’s made the Best of the Super Juniors finals twice (though he has not yet won) and is a former champion in the division. I have yet to see him have a bad match. He’s quick, he can pull off power moves, and everything he does is crisp and looks painful. I think he might just be the guy you beat on the way to the championship these days, but he is always a viable threat.
On the other hand, Hiromu is the best junior heavyweight in the company and is in the running for one of the best of all time. He has won BOSJ four times, including three straight from 2020-2022. He’s a five-time champion, with two of those reigns ending due to injury, and has even fared well against heavyweights. He made the semifinals of the New Japan Cup and is a former IWGP Tag Team Champion. The heavyweight version, that is. He has an eccentric gimmick and off-the-charts charisma that makes him a huge hit with fans.
Despite his popularity and success in the heavyweight division he has remained a junior heavyweight, openly saying he thought the junior division could headline major shows and he wanted to be part of it. The only reason I don’t think he is the top contender is that it might finally be time for him to make that step up and challenge for a major title.
Master Wato is the young gun in this grouping, and honestly his inclusion in this list might raise some eyebrows with my fellow New Japan enthusiasts. Despite having all the talent in the world, he has not really found a connection with the fans. He also has a tendency to miss big moves in important spots, which has not helped with his popularity.
The thing is, I believe he is just on the verge of finding that spark and taking a big step. He has the tools in the ring, he just needs to make people care. His current pairing with Yoh has done a lot to set him on that path, but a big win in BOSJ would certainly advance him along it in a hurry.
Kosei Fujita has seemingly been on the verge of breaking through for a while now. He recently lost the Junior Heavyweight tag titles to the brand-new pairing of Yoh and Master Wato, which would suggest that there are singles plans for him. Almost overnight he became one of the favourites for BOSJ. He’s absorbed a great deal from his faction leader Zack Sabre Jr, adding a submission game to his natural high-flying skills.
At just 22 years old it might be a little early to give him such an important ball to run with, but he has all the visible skills needed to pull it off.
IWGP Tag Team Championship
Holders: United Empire (Callum Newman and Great-O-Khan)
Top contenders: Taichi and Tomohiro Ishii, TMDK (Mikey Haste and Shane Nicholls)
The tag team division in New Japan is extremely sparse right now. There is really only one established team under contract, that being Hirooki Goto and Yoshi-Hashi (Bishamon). As Goto is currently the world champion, it seems highly unlikely they will be winning the titles any time soon.
The titles have also been an unfortunate casualty of the recent spate of departures, as they were held by Tetsuya Naito and Hiromu who won them from the Young Bucks (who were only ever likely to be transitional champions). With Naito working without a contract and signaling his intention to leave the promotion (although it was not yet public), they dropped the titles to Jeff Cobb & Callum Newman, somewhat unexpectedly.
When it was announced that Cobb would be leaving immediately, NJPW decided to strip him of the titles rather than have him drop them. Newman and O-Khan then beat Bishamon to win the championships. Newman is very young and might be one of the fastest humans I have seen in a wrestling ring. With O-Khan already holding a singles championship, it seems unlikely this run will be a long one.
Having said that, their next challengers are Taichi and Ishii. As you might remember, Ishii also holds a singles championship. That team is a new pairing that would seem to mesh well based on their styles, but we have literally no history to tell us if that’s accurate. They have one victory, albeit over the former champs in Naito and Hiromu, and apparently that was enough to give them the standing to challenge for the titles. It’s a sign of the paucity of contenders that a thrown-together team (who at least have history together in the same faction) is facing another thrown-together team. We don’t know when that match will be as of time of writing.
I’ll be honest, I only included TMDK here because I needed a second team. They are former double champions, holding the IWGP and Strong Openweight tag team championships as recently as last year. Having dropped both titles in quick succession, they essentially faded away. They previously wrestled as TM-61 in WWE, and recently Shane Haste has popped up in TNA, but all signs point to them still having an affiliation with New Japan and the stable that carries their name. If and when they do come back to Japan, they would be in line for a title shot purely based on being the only viable option.
IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship
Holders: Yoh and Master Wato
Top contenders: Yoshinobu Kanemaru and Sho, Taiji Ishimori and Robbie X, Kosei Fujita and Robbie Eagles
The junior divisions having more contenders than the heavyweight ones is a pretty good representation of the position the company is in as a whole right now. I didn’t even include the teams of Catch 2/2 (TJP & Francesco Akira) and International Jet Setters (Kushida & Kevin Knight), as most of the involved talent are on per-appearance deals with New Japan and it’s hard to say when they will be around.
The titles changed hands very recently, with Yoh & Wato pulling off something of an upset with their win over Ichiban Sweet Boys (Fujita & Eagles). Both men had won the titles before, Yoh with two different partners and Wato with one, but they had only recently come together as a team. Yoh’s character is hard to explain, kind of like a slightly toned-down Goldust without the makeup. Wato has started to head in that direction too, giving the team something of a comedic angle. They can more than back it up in the ring though, and they seem to have gelled together well in a hurry.
The House of Torture pairing of Sho & Kanemaru shot up my contender rankings with the title change. Sho & Yoh were long-time tag partners until Sho turned on Yoh, and they have feuded on and off ever since. House of Torture and the Hontai unit have been at each other’s throats for a while, so I would not be surprised to see something set up during BOSJ that leads to a title match.
Kanemaru is a wily veteran heel who has lost several steps but is wise enough to work around that. Sho and Yoh have a lot of in-ring similarities but their characters are very different. As a team, Kanemaru & Sho are contenders mostly because they are part of HoT and will almost assuredly cheat extensively.
Ishimori we have discussed before, but his Bullet Club War Dogs colleague Robbie X is one of the most innovative and spectacular high flyers in New Japan. They challenged Fujita and Eagles for the titles a few months ago, but have not competed much as a team since then. That’s largely because Robbie X is based in England, but he is scheduled to come over for BOSJ so there’s time and opportunity to challenge for the titles.
The Ichiban Sweet Boys of Eagles & Fujita only just lost the titles, but they are the most established team that still competes regularly. They compliment each other well, and during their reign they chalked up wins over all the best teams in the division: Catch 2/2, Kushida & Knight, and Moloney & Connors. I have them at the bottom of this list because they only just lost the titles, and because I think there are bigger plans for Fujita and the singles side of the junior division.
The fourth and (I think) final installment in this series will be a guide to the New Generation I have mentioned so often. They really do hold the keys to New Japan right now, and their positioning is just so uniquely Japanese that they warrant their own article. Thanks, as always, for stopping by.
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