Just some of the moments to look out for on the New Beginning USA tour starting Friday night in Tampa.
New beginning USA is finally here, as we visit five different cities in four states across nine days starting this Friday January 24. Here are some of the moments easily worth the ticket price on their own for each town.
Night 1- January 24, Tampa: Elimination madness
Our main event in Tampa sees a five on five elimination bout, with Tama Tonga, Tanga Loa, Yujiro Takahashi, Chase Owens & Jado of BULLET CLUB taking on Juice Robinson, David Finlay, Hiroshi Tanahashi, Kota Ibushi and Rocky Romero. With NJPW elimination tag matches seeing over the top rope eliminations joining pinfall and submissions, these bouts have been highlights of many a Korakuen Hall card in the past, and the same heated faction warfare is sure to make for a wild main event in Tampa.
Night 2, January 26 Nashville: Kojima vs Cobb
‘Hoss fight’ is a term that gets bandied about a lot in pro-wrestling coverage, but this is the dictionary definition of one. The hard hitting athletic prowess of Jeff Cobb will go one on one with the man in possession of still arguable the world’s strongest arm in Satoshi Kojima. Kojima has entered 2020 with points to prove, and the year has already seen him fight his heart out during the Fantasticamania tour, with a memorable bout against CMLL World Heavyweight Champion Ultimo Guerrero on January 19. Koji came up short in Korakuen Hall that night, but can he defeat Cobb in Nashville? Or will it be a suplex party?
Night 3- January 27 Durham: Misterioso vs TJP
Along with Barrett Brown and the Riegal Twins, Misterioso was one of four new names that were given a huge opportunity at Lion’s Break Project 2 in Anaheim last December, and is the first to be called back to NJPW action. When Durham hosts New Beginning in Raleigh, he’ll face stiff competition in TJP. The Fil-Am Flash returned to NJPW rings after a long absence for the Super J-Cup on the west coast in 2019, and he and Clark Connors would have a compelling run through the Super Junior Tag League in Japan. Durham’s opener should be a highly athletic encounter that will set a high pace for the evening.
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Night 4- January 30, Miami: Kota Ibushi & Hiroshi Tanahashi vs Guerrillas of Destiny
Hiroshi Tanahashi and Kota Ibushi make for a golden tag team indeed on paper. While The Ace has offered a lot of advice and encouragement to the Golden Star over the years, and the two have teamed together, it seems now that Ibushi and Tanahashi are a serious team, with IWGP Tag Team Championship aspirations, as we saw at New year Dash!!
The former champions GoD are hardly about to let the relative upstarts jump to the front of the line however. Indeed in Atlanta, a Wrestle Kingdom 14 rematch will see them battling to get their gold back (see below). That all makes for a must win scenario for Ibushi and Tanahashi in Miami: should they win, it would be safe for them to assume number one contendership status after the tour. If they lose, then the toughest brothers in the business will have effectively snuffed out a red hot team right at the word go.
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Night 5, February 1 Atlanta: OK, six highlights
We said one highlight from each night from the top of the article, but Atlanta is incredibly tough to choose for. The main event, obviously, sees David Finlay back in his home town of Atlanta and defending freshly won IWGP Tag gold with his FinJuice partner against GoD. Then underneath, Kota Ibushi will take on Chase Owens one on one, after Owens quietly scored the second best win record of the entire NJPW roster in 2019, and seeks the biggest challenge of his career. Then there’s Lance Archer versus Jeff Cobb, which will be an absolute war. In fact, there’s so much action going on through the week in every town, it’s probably best fans followe us on the road across the entire southeast!
