9 Things We Learned From NJPW Dominion 6.19
7. Redemption For YOSHI-HASHI
The major story throughout New Japan Pro Wrestling in 2016 has been the gang war between CHAOS and Los Ingobernables de Japon. The former features a long list of New Japan performers and has been an integral part of the company for years now, and is also led by the Ace of New Japan, Kazuchika Okada.
The latter are far newer to the company but have put NJPW in something of a stranglehold all year. Led by Tetsuya Naito, Los Ingobernables go against everything that New Japan stands for, and does it with a 'who gives a sh*t' attitude. LIdJ have dominated the feud for most of the year, highlighted by Naito defeating Okada for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship earlier in the year.
The feud also has a number of beefs within it, one of the most intriguing of which has been between CHAOS' YOSHI-HASHI and LIdJ's SANADA (there are a lot of stylised all-caps in New Japan). Y-H is angry at SANADA for giving up on NJPW without trying, whereas he himself has paid his dues more than most over the years. Y-H has existed in the last couple of years pretty much to pick up falls in six-man tags, but Dominion finally saw some glory for the 34-year old.
Y-H teamed up with Tomohiro Ishii to defeat SANADA and BUSHI, with SANADA tapping out to Y-H. The story of course continues, as quitting is what it has been about, but it was great to see YOSHI-HASHI finally get some redemption. This could be the start of bigger things for him.