At the end of today’s Wrestling Dontaku 2019 Night Two (for full results check here), given Hiroshi Tanahashi’s return and “Switchblade” Jay White’s challenge / beatdown of the 1/100 Ace, after Kazuchika Okada beat SANADA in their usual great back-and-forth main event, I felt pretty confident he would get to cut his post-match promo uninterrupted. Surely the IWGP Heavyweight Championship picture for Dominion 6.9 would be based on the winner of Switchblade/Tanahashi, no?
No. The lights went out, this video played, and I was very wrong, folks.
Chris Jericho is back, baby!
Not sure how I feel about him calling himself the Painmaker to go with his Clockwork Orange-inspired facepaint, but this is an exciting move in an age when I think a lot of us had already kind of accepted that All Elite Wrestling and New Japan wouldn’t have any further crossover. Is it the sign of a working agreement? I wouldn’t go that far, but it’s a good sign, and a welcome one given how fun Everyone’s Heavy Metal Dad Chris Jericho has been in a New Japan ring in this last run.
There you have it, folks
Excited to see the Painmaker and the Rainmaker clash at Dominion 6.9, Cagesiders?