10 Things New Japan Does Better Than WWE

By Matthew Dillon / November 12, 2016

Vince McMahon’s place atop the wrestling world is as certain as death and taxes, but that doesn’t mean his product is perfect. Before the dawn of the internet a wrestling fan might have been forgiven for thinking the WWE = wrestling, wrestling = WWE, and therefore whatever they did must have been the best possible way to do it.

However, there are corners of the earth that McMahon has not conquered, and it is there that some incredible wrestling has flourished. New Japan stands out to most as the biggest wrestling company not called WWE, but more importantly the promotion has also reshaped the question of what is the best wrestling company. Though they are severely lacking in some facets of the wrestling game, they excel in others to the point where WWE could actually learn a thing or two.

Here are 10 things that New Japan Pro Wrestling does better than the WWE.

10. Cruiserweights

Though it might seem unfair to lambast the WWE Cruiserweight division with it still being in its infancy, this isn’t the first time that WWE has tried to create a distinct role on the card for their smaller performers. Remember the belt that unceremoniously disappeared via Hornswoggle? I hope you don’t. I really hope you don’t.

WWE would love us to pretend that the purple ropes we see now represent a brand new creation but there’s no fooling the internet generation. We’ve seen WWE’s past mishandling of Cruiserweights, and many of us have also encountered the stellar junior division in New Japan. With the annual ‘Best of the Super Juniors’ always managing to capture the attention of worldwide fans (see Ospreay vs Ricochet) and the IWGP Junior Heavyweight championship with lineage including Finn Bálor, Jushin Thunder Liger, and Kota Ibushi, the junior division of New Japan maintains a meaningful role in the company that I’m sure WWE would like to eventually see from their new project.

Also the Young Bucks are stupidly entertaining. 2Sweeeeeet.