Another round of Takahashi vs. Lee, Cobb vs. Goto, and more to round out the full card for NJPW G1 Special in San Francisco

With those notable Kizuna Road shows in the can, New Japan Pro Wrestling saw fit to announce the full card for G1 Special in San Francisco next month, so let’s list the whole deal out and break our new additions down, folks.

G1 Special in San Francisco (July 7, 8PM Eastern / 5PM Pacific)

• Bullet Club (Chase Owens, Haku, Tama Tonga, Tanga Loa, & Yujiro Takahashi) vs. Chaos (Gedo, Rocky Romero, SHO, YOH, & YOSHI-HASHI)
• Chaos (Tomohiro Ishii & Toru Yano) vs. Suzuki-gun (Minoru Suzuki & Zack Sabre, Jr.)
• Bullet Club (Hangman Page & Marty Scurll) vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi & KUSHIDA
• Hirooki Goto (c) vs. Jeff Cobb (NEVER Openweight Championship)
• Los Ingobernables de Japon (EVIL & SANADA) vs. Young Bucks (Matt & Nick Jackson) (c) (IWGP Tag Team Championship)
• Chaos (Kazuchika Okada & Will Ospreay) vs. Los Ingobernables de Japon (BUSHI & Tetsuya Naito)
• Dragon Lee vs. Hiromu Takahashi (c) (IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship)
• “Switchblade” Jay White (c) vs. Juice Robinson (IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship)
• Cody Rhodes vs. Kenny Omega (c) (IWGP Heavyweight Championship)

So, looking at the full card, my first thought is that this is, at least on paper, a stronger card than Strong Style Evolved, which was bogged down a little with undercard tags and only featured one title match.

Onto our new additions, Dragon Lee challenging Hiromu Takahashi for the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship is supremely exciting. This will be the eighteenth time they’ve met, and every time out it’s one of the wildest and wooliest matches in pro wrestling today. Incredible chemistry, huge spots, lightning speed... if there’s one matchup in the junior heavyweight division that could happen on every show without getting old, this might be the one.

Plus Jeff Cobb gets a title shot against recently re-crowned NEVER Openweight Champion Hirooki Goto, which should be a fun slugfest, and our undercard tags are looking kinda good, to boot. Sure the Chaos/Suzuki-gun pairing is one we’ve seen before, but they work together well, and just look at that opening ten-man. Haku is back! He’s 59 years old and just as terrifying as ever, and I can’t wait to see him toss RPG3K around.

There you have it, folks

Excited for New Japan’s return to US soil, Cagesiders?