5 Most Insane Things Happening In Wrestling Right Now (May 11)
1. Dontak-ing The P*ss
If the tone towards some of Vince McMahon's recent ills has been less than sympathetic throughout this article, it's perhaps in-part due to the absolute roasting he's taken yet again from the competition he doesn't even consider competition.
48 hours before a Backlash card set the WWE's quality bar lower than it had been all year, New Japan Pro Wrestling produced an event of such insane quality that even the iconic 2000 edition of the April B-show might have struggled in its wake.
First, Chris Jericho made his spectacular NJPW return, bloodying Tetsuya Naito in a tantalising tease for their hedonistic Intercontinental Title clash at June's Dominion show. Still to come was a main event that - again in stark contrast to WWE a couple of days later - grabbed the headlines for the right reasons.
In a beautiful coda to their transcendent multi-match, multi-year rivalry, Kazuchika Okada's record-breaking (because it does matter) IWGP Title victory over Hiroshi Tanahashi was an evocative masterclass of luxurious physical storytelling and torch-passing magnificence. The pair earned *****1/2 stars from Wrestling Observer tastemaker Dave Meltzer, and blusterous plaudits from those that had already seen them collide 10 times in the last five years.
Oh, and the climax of the show only laid the table for the fourth match in the most celebrated series in pro wrestling history. Kenny Omega's show-closing stare-down with 'The Rainmaker' generated the second half of Dominion's double main event.
WWE's Money In The Bank will follow that show a week later, but it's hard to see how NJPW again doesn't steal all the adulation long before a ladder is even scaled.