August 12, 2023 News and Notes

• Not much has changed in many years in New Japan Pro Wrestling, if the 2023 G1 Climax Final is to be any indication.
• Tetsuya Naito defeated Will Ospreay in one semifinal.
• Kazuchka Okada defeated EVIL (who upset (and earned an IWGP World Heavyweight Championship match against this Fall) his former partner SANADA in the quarterfinals) in the other.
• Since 2012, either Okada or Naito has won the tournament six times -- this will be the seventh.
• Okada has won four times (2012, 2014, 2021, 2022).
• Naito has won twice (2013, 2017).
• It is, however, the first time the two will face each other in the Final.
• The winner receives the Challenger Rights to challenge whomever is the IWGP World Heavyweight Champion at the main event of Wrestle Kingdom 18 at the Tokyo Dome on January 4, 2024.
• The Rights must be defended and are usually defended in the Fall against any wrestler who defeated the Rights-holder in the G1 Climax.
• This would appear to make Okada the favorite to win his fifth G1 Climax and his third in a row.  This is because of the fact that one of the two men who defeated Naito in the tournament was Shane Haste, a lower-level member of New Japan Pro Wrestling of America.  The other was Jeff Cobb.
• A far more attractive Rights match awaits Okada if/when he wins:  Will Ospreay would get the chance.
• An Okada win would tie him with Masa Chono with the most G1 Climax wins in history -- five.
• It appears at least four ACC schools do not want Cal-Berkeley or Stanford in the conference.  Then who does?  The Mountain West?  It appears we finally have our first two demotions out of the Power Four/Five:  Washington State and Oregon State are being relegated out.