La Zona Muerta

Not a lot moves me in the world of wrestling anymore. It takes a pretty big, emotional sendoff or climax to an important story to get me. But when Hiromu Takahashi came out this weekend in Fukuoka with "LIJ" written on his wrist tape, when BUSHI came out and couldn't stop himself from crying, I lost it. Ten years of living dangerously, ten years of living UNGOVERNABLE, coming to an end, before my eyes. 

"What's that?" My buddy once asked some time ago, pointing to my giant black flag / beach towel bearing the logo of LOS INGOBERNABLES DE JAPON. I considered my answer briefly; I didn't want to be curt and say "a wrestling thing," but I didn't want to give him a full on fanboy answer, either. "Imagine a group of wrestling bad guys so cool that they expanded from Mexico to Japan," I said simply. In a different world, he would have replied "like LOS PERROS DEL MAL?" but that's not the Earth *I* occupy.

I'm probably not the right person to do a career retrospective of Tetsuya Naito. I'm not a huge fan of his pre LIJ work as the Stardust Genius and I've only really only seen the last ten or so years of his career with anything resembling a keen eye. As always, I can only really give you MY experiences with watching the man... but in light of his last match in New Japan this weekend... I couldn't let it go unremarked.

I have to assume my first exposure to Tetsuya Naito was Wrestle Kingdom 8. Oh, it's possible that I had seen Naito as part of No Limit with (ugh) Yujiro Takahashi in TNA, I suppose... but good Gotch above; seeing guys on excursion in TNA is like not seeing them at all. I found No Limit to be fairly unnoteworthy when looking back. 

Perhaps infamously, there was a fan vote as to what the main event of Kingdom 8 should be and the fans chose Hiroshi Tanahashi and the incredibly charismatic, on the hottest streak of his career Shinsuke Nakamura over Naito and Kazuchika Okada. Naito had been soundly booed when he defeated Tanahashi in the final of that year's G1 Climax. Whether that was due to a rejection of Naito or just the fact that Tanahashi was universally beloved... I can't truly say. History says the crowds "rejected" Naito and I suppose there's an element of truth to that; when I go back and watch this era of Naito, it just seems to me like it was more of a case of "right place, wrong time," but I lack the full historical perspective. From what I've seen, it feels SOMEWHAT like the situation with Shota Umino, but the problem with Umino is that the crowds don't HATE him, they simply don't CARE about him.  

History also tells us this snub, this DEMOTION from being in the main event would lead to the formation of Los Ingobernables de Japon, but that was nearly two years away at this point. 

I can't genuinely recall what I thought about this match at the time. I'm sure perennially awful announcer Matt Striker paid some lip service to the fact that the world heavyweight title was being relegated to the semi main event but honestly, I was so smitten with Nakamura by that point that I'm not sure I noticed, cared or minded. That's probably terribly unfair to both Naito AND Okada... and obviously the fact that this match was relegated served as grist for the mill of every encounter they would later have. Naito had stated that he wanted to be the star, the one to eclipse Tanahashi, but his true rival really ended up being Okada. 

And after WK8? Naito went back to being a mid carder or a semi main event guy. Wrestle Kingdom 9 saw Naito in a match versus AJ Styles. This was BULLET CLUB AJ, the guy who was probably, for a minute there, the best wrestler in the world. I've seen that match since... I don't think I had a huge impression of it at the time. As I recall, it was more about the Styles Clash and the fact that AJ had recently broken Yoshi Tatsu's neck with it than anything else. 

This was the year where Naito went back to Mexico... and like Nakamura before him... whatever it was that he found there (apparently some low key racism with Mexican fans holding open their eyes at him!)... he came back... changed. 

  

Stupid, sexy Naito

So what was the deal with the original Los Ingobernables, anyway?

Imagine a cool guy, a good guy, a “technico,” who was ALSO getting booed by his home crowds… who got a partner and told the fans to go screw themselves… and thereby the hottest stable in Mexico was formed; a group of cool ass heel rulebreakers running rampant. UNGOVERNABLE. Inject NAITO into that mix a year later… and it’s no wonder Naito’s character completely changed. Now he was a cool, suit wearing guy who well and truly didn’t give a fuck about the fans… or the rules.

And in no longer caring… he became BELOVED by pretty much everyone. No longer the desperate to impress Stardust Genius; he was cool, calm (except when he wasn’t) and now… he would strike like a snake, like a cat scratching and biting the hand that fed it. He was unfettered; he had reached his final form.

As my spouse and I began watching NJPW more regularly, as we became bigger fans, we would discuss who we liked.

“I like the eye guy,” I would say.

“Which one is he?”

“The guy that opens his eye with his fingers like this,” I would demonstrate, casting my eye WIDE with my pointer finger and thumb.

“Oh yeah, him,” she would say. “He’s okay.”

Over the years to come, we would find Naito to be a lot more than simply “okay.” For me, it was probably specifically after he won the Intercontinental Championship and would drag it around, kick it, hurl it into the ring without looking and otherwise abuse the title that he really gained a permanent hold on my heart. If the ring attendant was too slow to hold open the ropes for Naito? A shove, maybe a pie face and LOTS of trolling. If the referee didn’t go the right way, didn’t hold up Naito’s hand fast enough or with enough gusto? Maybe a fakeout punch or, if he was really pissed, a seated dropkick. And if a COMMENTATOR didn’t extol the virtues of LIJ? He might get a shirt ripped off or even stomped out. Los Ingobernables de Japon may have been fan favorites in a way the Mexican branches weren’t, exactly but sometimes their rudo roots would show.

Here’s the secret about the post second excursion Naito character… he doesn’t care… but it’s a MASK because he secretly CARES TOO MUCH. This will slip out on occasion… look at the G1 Climax final he has with Kenny Omega. (And as an aside… everyone FREAKED OUT when Omega started having those allegedly Wrestling Observer Newsletter scale breaking but not really matches with Okada… people HOWLED about how since Omega was friends with Dave, how the scale was negatively impacted… but they failed to take into account how men like Okada and Naito would have “scale buster” matches with Kenny and other wrestlers, too. Maybe instead of DAVE being the problem, maybe it was the fact that Omega and Okada and Naito and Kota Ibushi and Will Ospreay were all REALLY GOOD at what they did? Hmmmm.) In this grueling, VIOLENT match, Naito lets pride get the better of him… and he scrambles up the ropes to perform his OLD finishing move, the Stardust Press, the move he principly used as his old self, the “so called “Stardust Genius.” In doing so… he misses entirely. A FOOL, but for a moment, he cared and wanted that connection to the past back. It wouldn’t be the last time he’d try to go back to the Stardust Press, either.

It’s the small things, it’s little details like that that make Naito one of my favorite wrestlers of the modern day.

An all time favorite Naito moment for me; his complete dismissal of his more similar than he’d care to admit rival in Pro Wrestling NOAH, the volatile KENOH. This led to a troll war of KENOH desperately attempting to get Naito’s goat. KENOH didn’t make it happen

And there came a time… a time when Tetsuya Naito began to slow down. Began to not have as many of the classic matches, began to conserve himself more in multi man tags. People would laugh about the output of “t-shirt Naito,” a sign that he didn’t care when he wore a t-shirt (does Okada give his all on multi man tags? Tanahashi? It’s SUPPOSED to be like that to extend the runtime of the top wrestlers). Did New Japan strike when Naito was at his absolute peak, cornating him with the IWGP Heavyweight title in the Tokyo Dome at Wrestle Kingdom 13?

No.

They waited an extra year to cement Okada’s legacy before finally letting Naito overcome his generational rival on the biggest stage NJPW has. I’m not a “it used to be better” guy… mostly… but the intensity of the fan connection to Naito when he’s in the dome… 40,000 people screaming his name, cheering so loud that the cheers ECHO back on themselves… I genuinely don’t think it will EVER be like that again in New Japan. Did waiting a year hurt Naito? That’s probably a debate that will never be solved… and of course, no one saw the pandemic coming… Naito arguably became the ABSOLUTE MAN in NJPW at the worst possible time. Still, despite the turmoil and disruption the pandemic wreaked upon the Japanese wrestling scene, damage that’s only really just now fading, he got to be the person to end the career of someone he had a LOT in common with, the timeless Keiji Mutoh. Mutoh was no fool… once he realized he couldn’t get someone from the US to be in his final match, he turned to the literal most popular wrestler in Japan. Oh, Mutoh made it all about himself, of course, but I suppose that’s fine; this wasn’t about putting over Naito; it was about the emotion of sending off Mutoh into the sunset.

And then, as they do, things began to unravel. Naito started to get hurt more frequently. It was revealed that his vision was messed up, requiring multiple surgeries. His knees, of course, were a complete mess from years of doing things like the Stardust Press amongst other high flying, high speed moves. He missed a whole G1 due to getting a knee blown out in a match with Zack Sabre Jr. He would come back too soon from injuries, from surgery, because New Japan was relying on him to fill in the gaps whenever they had a main event that wasn’t killer. He had to be carried through a match in the 2023 G1 by Will Ospreay when Naito was legitimately knocked out. He got past former stablemate SANADA in a somewhat bittersweet affair in that year’s Dome main event. He dropped the title to Jon Moxley (sigh) and got it back in a lackluster match that was not a good showing for EITHER man. He ended up ultimately losing the title at an October show to his friendly rival Sabre Jr. and then New Japan promptly slotted him into a tag team role with his real life friend and LIJ stablemate Hiromu Takahashi. He’d basically done everything he could do in New Japan.

New Japan NEEDED Tetsuya Naito, at whatever capacity they could have him in.

Did Tetsuya Naito NEED New Japan?

And so we come to the end of the road with this wonderful, infuriating man

April Fool’s day, it came out Naito was not working under contract. I paid it no heed; Naito is (in)famous for using Tokyo Sports to run angles, be silly and otherwise propagate his character.

Then, suddenly, New Japan themselves announced that Naito and his ride or die, the faithful masked man BUSHI would be wrapping up their New Japan commitments on May the 4th. He really HAD been working without a contract and had reached an impasse with New Japan… whether it was over money or number of dates or whatever… it all came down to the same thing.

New Japan and Naito were parting ways… and none of us know what that means. Could he crash a NOAH show? Could he start running Los Ingo Pro and run Naito produce shows every quarter? Could he FINALLY take time off and get his eyes and knees fixed?

Well, probably not that one.

As much as I would rather Naito just kick back and go watch a season’s worth of Hiroshima Carp games live from the dugout, I have a feeling he’s not quite done with wrestling and wrestling’s not quite done with him. As for what shape that could take…?

TRANQUILO.

ASSENAYO.