NJPW G1 Climax 30: Every Participant's Chance Of Winning Ranked From Worst To Best
3. Tetsuya Naito
He might be the current Heavyweight and Intercontinental Champion but Tetsuya Naito can win the G1 Climax this year. Now, the top champion very rarely wins the G1 Climax while holding the belt - only Keiji Mutoh in 1995 and Kensuke Sasaki in 2000 have achieved this. If Naito's going to be the first man in 20 years to win the G1 as IWGP Heavyweight Champion, there has to be a big reason why.
He would be unlikely to take the G1 victory for a third time if it wasn't for the cancelled match with Hiromu Takahashi from the Anniversary Show. He has never had a singles match with his protege and since the planned match of theirs was cancelled due to the pandemic, Naito winning the G1 and selecting his successor to face him at the Tokyo Dome is maybe the best narrative hook that Wrestle Kingdom could achieve.
It's not guaranteed that they'd commit to an angle such as this, especially given NJPW's previous hesitations about pushing Naito as the top star, but the Hiromu match needs to happen at some point. Since Hiromu has dropped his Junior Heavyweight title to Taiji Ishimori, there is a chance that Naito could pull out another miracle and change the G1's history forever.