Chris Jericho Jumps Tetsuya Naito at NJPW New Year Dash – Results

Looks like Chris Jericho is staying in New Japan for at least another match. New Year Dash is traditionally the show where New Japan sets up the angles for the early part of the forthcoming year and it did not disappoint. At the end of the show, Naito cut a promo saying how he lost to Okada and has no excuses, but Los Ingobernables De Japon would continue to evolve throughout 2018.

The other big story coming out of the event is a story with multiple threads as after the Bullet Club tag match, Cody was beating down Kota Ibushi and was going to hit him with a chair with the help of his fellow Bullet Club members aside from Marty Scurll who seemed to be trying to talk Cody out of it. That was until Kenny Omega made the save. Kenny told Cody he was the leader, not him and Cody seemed to back down. Kenny then cut a promo saying that the Bullet Club lacked unity, but knew how that could be solved and he called out “Switchblade” Jay White and invited him to join the Bullet Club. White proceeded to put on the shirt, but when Omega hugged him, White dropped Omega to the mat with the Blade Runner.

The final angle setup was a much more simple affair, with Suzuki-gun winning their match and Minoru Suzuki holding Hiroshi Tanahashi in a submission hold before declaring he is the next champion.

Overall, the show did exactly what it set out to do with some fun matches and setting up the forthcoming stories. It’s a shame that The New Beginning in Sapporo on 27th January seems so far away. Full results below.

Manabu Nakanishi, Hiroyoshi Tenzan, Satoshi Kojima & Yuji Nagata defeated Ren Narita, Shota Umino, Tetsuhiro Yagi, & Tomoyuki Oka by pinfall with a clothesline from Kojima on Umino.

Suzuki-gun (El Desperado, Taichi, TAKA Michinoku, Takashi Iizuka & Yoshinobu Kanemaru) defeated Henare, Hirai Kawato, Jushin Liger, Tiger Mask IV, & Togi Makabe by pinfall with Pinche Loco from Desperado on Kawato.

“Switchblade” Jay White defeated Katsuya Kitamura by pinfall after the Blade Runner. This is the first match in Kitamura’s best of 7 challenge to try and graduate from being a young lion.

The Elite (Kenny Omega and The Young Bucks) defeated Cheeseburger & Roppongi 3K (SHO & YOH) by pinfall with an Indytaker on Cheeseburger.

Bullet Club (Chase Owens, Cody Rhodes, Marty Scurll, Leo Tonga, & Yujiro Takahashi) defeated Taguchi Japan (David Finlay, Kota Ibushi, KUSHIDA, Juice Robinson & Ryusuke Taguchi) by submission with American Nightmare from Rhodes on Finlay.

GOD (Tama Tonga & Tonga Roa) & Bad Luck Fale defeated Chaos (Beretta, Tomohiro Ishii & Toru Yano) (c) by pinfall with a Gun Stun from Tama on Beretta and won the NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag Team Championship which they lost last night at Wrestle Kingdom 12.

Suzuki-gun (Minoru Suzuki, Davey Boy Smith, Jr., Lance Archer & Zack Sabre Jr.) defeated Hiroshi Tanahashi, Michael Elgin & War Machine (Hanson & Ray Rowe) by pinfall after KES hit a Killer Bomb KES on Hanson.

Los Ingobernables de Japon (BUSHI, EVIL, Hiromu Takahashi, SANADA & Tetsuya Naito) defeated Chaos (Gedo, Hirooki Goto, Kazuchika Okada, Will Ospreay & YOSHI-HASHI) by pinfall after a Destino from Naito on YOSHI-HASHI.