Katsuyori Shibata Returns To The Ring At NJPW G1 Climax Finals!

After almost dying in the ring in 2017, Katsuyori Shibata just worked his first match in four years.

By Andy H Murray /

NJPW

Katsuyori Shibata mounted a sensational, improbable return to the ring on today's NJPW G1 Climax 31 finals show, working Zack Sabre Jr. in his first wrestling match since 2017.

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ZSJ, who wasn't booked on the card, hit the ring for an unannounced segment. Cue: Shibata's entrance theme hitting while Sabre started warming up for a match that nobody, not even the boldest optimists, could have predicted before the event.

With both wrestlers dressed in fight shorts, the ring announcer confirmed a five-minute, UWF rules exhibition match. Worked at a brisk, urgent pace, especially for what was essentially a grappling contest, it went to a draw when neither man was able to submit the other within the five minutes.

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Sabre and Shibata shook hands in a show of sportsmanship. Seconds later, Shibata was given a microphone, announcing, incredibly, that the next time he was in a New Japan ring, it would be for a match, per English announcer Chris Charlton.

This was the first time Shibata has wrestled since suffering a subdural hematoma requiring emergency surgery in April 2017. He had just wrestled Kazuchika Okada in an acclaimed IWGP Heavyweight Title match at NJPW's Sakura Genesis 2017 event, with repeated shoot headbutts and extreme dehydration the cause of his affliction.

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A grim prognosis followed. Shibata was given an "18% or less" chance of surviving, let alone competing again, but he pulled through. Though unlikely to ever work another match, he returned to let a 2017 G1 Climax crowd know he was still alive in a moment that brought many in the audience to tears. He then got physical with KENTA and Bullet Club two years later, brawling and taking bumps at that year's G1 final, but this came to nothing.

Now, 'The Wrestler' is back.

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