If youāre a combat sports fan with an affinity for pro wrestling then chances are you probably have already seen New Japan Wrestlingās Wrestle Kingdom 14. This year, their traditional January 4th show was turned into a 2 night extravaganza. NJPW was having a great year to start off with a great 2 night event and the subsequent shows after.
A major part of their calendar was altered by the 2020 Summer Olympics meaning that they decided to change their G1 Summer tournament into a fall tournament to avoid the Olympics detracting from their audience and other factors. Unfortunately, that would not be the only detraction in their events.
The global pandemic forced NJPW to alter their plans and in effect cancel all of their March events and shows. NJPW being a company that has in the past, shown a want to provide content to their audience and be that outlet of fun, excitement and exuberance that only NJPW can do, decided you use their talent to entertain in different ways.
The long anticipated anniversary show was canceled along with the equally hotly anticipated match between popular Los Ingobernables de Japon stablemates, the NJPW Double Gold Champion (Heavyweight and Intercontinental) Tetsuya Naito and NJPW Junior Heavyweight Hiromu Takahashi was also shelved.
The long held tradition of the NJPW anniversary show being headlined by the Heavyweight Champion Vs the Junior Heavyweight Champion would not happen this year, but the two ultra popular competitors and stablemates would join forces to create content for their fans as part of NJPWās Together project.
This initiative kept the value of having the NJPW World service. The Los Ingobernables duo would do an interview show and a talk show together. Other events were planned as party of this initiative and for the Japanese audience, these were fun takeaways to help ease the cost of paying for a subscription that wouldnāt be delivering content like have been.
For the English speaking fans, unless you can speak or understand Japanese, you were sorta left out, but to NJPWās credit they did continue their stead clip of content by adding English commentary to match that havenāt had the English commentary treatment and now NJPW is giving fans who stepped away or havenāt stepped in a reason to come back.
NJPW is providing this years Wrestle Kingdom show (both nights) completely free. So if you have a friend that isnāt in on NJPW then share this check this out. Itās a very long show both nights are in the 4+ hours range but are chock full of action and pageantry.
Pro Wrestling has long been my favorite form of escapism and right now we could all use this. If you saw it before rewatch it, if you havenāt seen it, then please you owe it to yourself to watch and be entertained for 8+ hours.
Also if you can afford to drop $10 on a niche streaming service then do so here or at the very least do so on independent pro wrestling. A lot of talented folks have seen their chance to shine with a large watching audience evaporate because of the pandemic, and as such so did their chance to make money to live their dream and entertain their new and long time fans. Buy a shirt, buy stream, enjoy a show. This is possibly the best chance a lot of will have to catching up or checking out a show or an event so go do that. Not like thereās much else to do.
Take care fighters, and never stop fighting.
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