10 Early Predictions For NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 12

By John Bills / July 4, 2017

4. NEVER Openweight Championship - Minoru Suzuki (C) Vs. Juice Robinson

WCPW/The Ringside Perspective

Somewhere along the way, the NEVER Openweight Championship went from being a title for all shapes and sizes to being one for bruisers and bruisers alone. Previous champions include Tomohiro Ishii, Katsuyori Shibata, Togi Makabe, and Hirooki Goto, men known for their willingness to take stiff shots that wise men would avoid.

Current champion Minoru Suzuki isn't exactly the fluffiest of workers either. Shockingly, the NEVER Openweight Championship represents Suzuki's first singles title in New Japan, and a long run is in the offing. His Wrestle Kingdom challenger will likely be set up during the G1 Climax, with Michael Elgin one option.

I'm going to go with Juice Robinson standing across the ring from Suzuki inside the Tokyo Dome. Robinson's rise to prominence in New Japan is one of the great modern wrestling stories - a singles championship win in the Tokyo Dome would be an emotional way to cap it.

Authored by John Bills

Contributor

Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.

Posted On: 8th Jul 2017

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NJPW Kazuchika Okada Wrestle Kingdom 12