The IWGP IC Title & New Japan’s Blueprint For Elevating A Midcard Championship

On January 4th, 2014, 35,000 fans packed into the Tokyo Dome in Tokyo, Japan to attend Wrestle Kingdom 8, the signature New Year’s show of New Japan Pro Wrestling. NJPW’s equivalent of WrestleMania, the card was headlined by a clash between the two apex performers of NJPW’s post-2010 revival; three-time IWGP Heavyweight Champion and de facto leader of NJPW tweener faction CHAOS Shinsuke Nakamura would defend his championship against six-time IWGP Heavyweight Champion and unquestioned face of the company Hiroshi Tanahashi. In a match which received widespread acclaim, Tanahashi defeated Nakamura to become the new champion.

Only the title in question wasn’t the IWGP Heavyweight Championship; in the main event of Wrestle Kingdom 8, Hiroshi Tanahashi defeated Shinsuke Nakamura to capture the IWGP Intercontinental Championship for the very first time. Less than three years after its creation, the IWGP Intercontinental Championship was headlining NJPW’s biggest and most successful show of the year.

In the run-up to WrestleMania 31 this Sunday, one of the main talking points of WrestleMania season has been the constant rumors of what WWE will do with its maligned midcard titles. The WWE Intercontinental Championship will be up for grabs in a seven-man ladder match featuring the likes of Daniel Bryan, Dolph Ziggler, and Dean Ambrose, among others, while the WWE United States Championship will see the champion Rusev defend against John Cena. At the time of writing, the latest speculation has Bryan and Cena winning the IC and US Title respectively in an effort to bring legitimacy back to those titles.

Anyone who has been following the WWE product the last couple of years will know that the midcard titles have not been protected by the booking team; thus in terms of prestige and elevating the person holding the belt, the midcard belts have been reduced to a non-factor. Looking at the current titleholders, we can still see a pattern of apathy in terms of using the title to elevate a wrestler. Ever since defeating Sheamus for the US Title in November 2014, Rusev has had only one feud for the title (against the completely diminished Jack Swagger) before entering his current program against Cena. The case of the IC Title is even more dire; ever since winning by DQ at the Fastlane Special in February, current IC Title holder Bad News Barrett has not recorded a single win of any type on TV while taking seven losses in both singles and tag action in that span.

I am always hesitant to compare NJPW and WWE because they are wrestling products that exist in two completely different universes. While WWE exists in the McMahon Sports Entertainment-verse where titles don’t matter and celebrities routinely make WWE athletes look like weak chumps, NJPW still exists in a world of near-kayfabe, where both the brand and the audience practice a strict adherence to the competition aspect of pro-wrestling. However, if WWE is actually serious about using Cena and Bryan to elevate their midcard titles coming out of WrestleMania, a blueprint of how to use a top draw to elevate a moribund title already exists with NJPW and Shinsuke Nakamura.

The IWGP Intercontinental Championship was first created to commemorate NJPW’s May 2011 tour of the United States. An eight-man tournament was held to crown the first ever champion; looking at the field, it becomes apparent that NJPW originally had no grand designs for this new title to be anything more than mid-card filler. Future main-eventers Kazuchika Okada and Tetsuya Naito were in the bracket, but at the time, both were on learning excursions in the US and were not considered anywhere near main-eventers. Other members of the tournament were current Bullet Club member Yujiro, Hideo Saito (currently working as the masked jobber-to-the-stars Captain New Japan), NJPW’s resident dirty tactician Toru Yano, and former WWE and current TNA wrestler MVP. Yano and MVP met in the finals on May 15th and had a title match that nobody would ever describe as a “classic”; if you have time, you can view the match in its entirety below:


MVP would go on to defend the title a couple of times against Yano in subsequent NJPW cards in 2011. During this time, IC Title matches were usually fourth or fifth from the top of the card and never exceeded 15 minutes or so. However, at NJPW Alive! 2011, MVP would drop the title to former ECW Champion Masato Tanaka; while that title change wasn’t very noteworthy, Tanaka’s first defense of the IC Title in a December 2011 tour show main event against NJPW fan favorite and headbutt enthusiast Tomoaki Honma went 22 minutes is now considered a classic IWGP IC Title match:

Despite this, the IC Title was still not prestigious enough to be booked on Wrestle Kingdom 6. Tanaka would drop the IC Title to Hirooki Goto in Feburary 2012 at New Beginning, in a show that was eventually main-evented by Okada’s first IWGP Heavyweight Championship victory over Tanahashi. Within a year, both MVP and Tanaka would be gone from NJPW.

Hirooki Goto is NJPW’s “nearly man”. A multiple-time tournament winner in both singles and tag action, Goto has only one brief reign as IWGP Tag Team Champion and never been able to win “the big one” despite having a plethora of title shots over his career. At the time of his winning the IC Title, he had already won two New Japan Cups and the 2008 G1 Climax, but had failed to successfully cash in any of the title shots that he had earned. Positioned third from top of the New Beginning card and given only about 13 minutes to work, Goto winning the IWGP IC belt didn’t have the feel or crowd reaction befitting of a title that the NJPW audience would consider to be one of the “big ones” (the match is available on NJPW World).

The IWGP Intercontinental Title was gaining momentum, but it still wasn’t up there yet in terms of a prestigious belt that elevates the holder. This was confirmed as much; instead of defending the IC belt he had just won, Goto immediately entered the New Japan Cup for a shot at the IWGP Heavyweight Title. At this point, you could say that the IWGP IC Title was where the WWE IC and US Titles are on their better days in the last half-decade, with the holder getting to rub shoulders with other wrestlers gunning for the main belt. Goto would go on to win the NJC for the third time, setting up a Champion vs Champion main event against Okada at Wrestling Dontaku in May 2012. Goto would lose once again, and then would drop the IC Title to Shinsuke Nakamura in July.

Nakamura, one of NJPWs top stars who had survived the self-destructiveness of Antonio Inoki’s senile booking of NJPW in the mid-2000s, was in a slight funk prior to his IC Title win over Goto. Despite having won the 2011 G1 Climax, he had failed in his title shot against Tanahashi, and then had teamed with Yano to represent CHAOS in a match against rival promotion Pro Wrestling NOAH’s representatives Go Shiozaki and Naomichi Marufuji at Wrestle Kingdom 6. Team NOAH won, and with CHOAS stablemate Okada defeating Tanahashi at New Beginning in February, Nakamura’s standing in both NJPW and as the leader of CHAOS was under threat.

Nakamura needed a shot in the arm, having not tasted Championship Gold since 2010. The IWGP Intercontinental Title needed a main-eventer to make the belt a main-event Championship. It was a match made in heaven.

Nakamura first reign would last 313 days, defending it a record eight times, more than every other IC Champion before him combined. True to the roots of IC Title, Nakamura defended it against many gaijin wrestlers, most notably in a match against Davey Boy Smith Jr. which constitutes Davey Boy’s best singles match in NJPW to date. Nakamura would then lose the IC Title in Mexico in a two out of three falls match against top CMLL and lucha libre star La Sombra, only to win it back in the return match in Japan and begin his second reign as IC Champion. In his second reign, Nakamura would avenge his loss to NOAH’s Marufuji and also defeat the challenge of perennial main-eventer Minoru Suzuki, further solidifying the Intercontinental Championship’s status as a main-event draw.

The final ascent came after Nakamura’s win over Suzuki; when asked who he felt the next challenger to his belt should be, Nakamura named his longtime rival and the face of NJPW Tanahashi. Tanahashi, who had been involved in an epic yearlong feud with Okada trading the IWGP Heavyweight Title, accepted Nakamura’s challenge. In affirmation of the status that these two titans of NJPW had brought the belt, fans voted their match to be the main event of Wrestle Kingdom 8 over the IWGP Heavyweight Title match between Okada and Naito. Their main event at WK8 completed the journey of the IWGP Intercontinental Championship from novelty tour afterthought to the summit of puroresu prestige.

With all that said, is any of the IWGP IC Title’s history applicable to what WWE may be trying to do with its own midcard titles? In short, yes. Since the Tanahashi/Nakamura match at WK8 a year ago, the IWGP IC Title match has main-evented five NJPW PPVs and of course co-main evented WK9 in a spectacular match between Nakamura and Kota Ibushi. Lest we forget, NJPW’s worst performing show (relative to venue capacity) in 2014 was Back to Yokohama Arena in May, a show which was headlined by Okada vs AJ Styles for the IWGP Heavyweight Title (and also featured Nakamura defending the IC Title in a forgettable MMA-gimmick match against jiu jitsu stylist Daniel Gracie). Seeing as the WWE World Championship match at WrestleMania is between Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar this Sunday, WWE is going to be left with either a Champion which only works limited dates (Lesnar) or a Champion who is at best slightly below average in the ring and has no hope right now of carrying any lengthy matches (Reigns).

In the scenario that WWE have made for themselves, it is not only imperative, but essential that they put a top star on their midcard belts, and actually have them win title defenses cleanly on TV and PPVs so that fans will accept the concept that the secondary titles are now acceptable main events. Hoping that Bryan will be booked in such a way may perhaps be foolish, but its not a given that Bryan will win the WWE IC Title anyway; should Lesnar retain at WrestleMania, Bryan may be kept off the IC Title to feud with Lesnar post-Mania.  Cena with the US Title has a much better chance of accomplishing this, especially if the IC and US Titles are unified at a later date. Cena vs Ziggler, Cena vs Ambrose, Cena vs Luke Harper, all of these are examples of matchups that today would feel pretty fresh and would also have the potential to be PPV-quality main events. If Vince McMahon and WWE are dead set on Reigns being in the World Championship picture in the immediate future, the stage is set for the long-suffering WWE midcard titles to finally get the shine fans have been calling for.

Strong midcard titles can be what’s best for business and a great platform for making new stars and reheating older ones. Just ask Shinsuke Nakamura and NJPW. If those within WWE not named Vince McMahon take heed of NJPW’s formula for making the IWGP IC Title matter, then WWE will regain a huge asset of a prestigious title which will pay immediate dividends coming out of WrestleMania season.