5 Most Insane Things Happening In Wrestling Right Now (Sept 28)

At NJPW Destruction In Kobe, Gedo sent a seismic shock through the New Japan Pro Wrestling landscape.

For six years, the man championed Kazuchika Okada on his journey from racist TNA caricature to rain-making playboy to improbable IWGP Heavyweight Champion to one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time. He shouted 'COME ON RAINMAKER' as if New Japan's very success depended on him effectively supplanting Hiroshi Tanahashi as the top star of the company, and in a neat meta touch, it more or less did, as Tanahashi's wear and tear crept up to an extent that saw him miss stretches of action in this glorious twilight era of his run. For those unaware of the goings-on in the east, imagine what Vince McMahon must do in gorilla when Roman Reigns jerks his own arm off, and you're close to the conviction Gedo showed in his man.

After all this time, Okada almost transcended Ace status by becoming the most dominant, calculable storyline force in company history. And, with a Hulk Hogan-level chair shot, Gedo, spurned by the new Broken incarnation of his man, ushered in a new chapter of his company's main event by siding with CHAOS disruptor Jay White in an electric sports entertainment-flavoured mega angle.

This followed another impossibly great development - how Gedo has managed to continue, subvert, and create scope for another continuation of Okada Vs. Tana is mind-blowing - and another impossibly great match. Tanahashi, five years prior at King Of Pro Wrestling, feigned a knee injury in a landmark of their grand narrative. Here, in something of a reckoning that drove the tension, he sold it in a G.O.A.T-level babyface performance.

It was a move as shocking as it was ingenious; the mere association of Gedo with Jay White elevates the latter as a made man, and creates legitimate doubt over the Tokyo Dome main event - because what happened the last time Gedo selected a man to stand by?