New Japan Cup, Night 8 & 9, Semi-Finals & Finals

So last night, LIJ won of all of their matches and of course, Okada won making this semi-finals round very interesting.  For the most part this tournament has been really good and also shocking with some of the results.  It seems to me like they've been building to a particular rematch and I will discuss that later, as in this article I'll be I'll be giving my predictions for the finals as well.  Here's an updated bracket to this point.

Night 8, Semi-Finals

Hiromu Takahashi vs. Kazuchika Okada

This match...is going to be...amazing.  I can't wait to watch this match.  I've been saying it over and over again, Hiromu Takahashi, has the brightest future of pretty much anyone in this tournament.  The problem here is, he's facing the golden goose.  Again, I don't want people to think I hate Okada, he's so good at what he does he's one of the best in the world at it.  I'm just tired of seeing him win all the time, and being protected so often even when he isn't the champion, and as I said last night, he had the easiest road to the semi-finals, and that in itself is even more annoying to me.  Hiromu is the Junior Heavyweight Champion, and we were supposed to see him face Naito in a champion versus champion non-title match at the anniversary show, and unfortunately that didn't happen.  However, do they think he's ready to beat Okada, probably not.  It's gonna be a hell of a match and I wish Hiromu was gonna win but he probably won't, I think this is going to be the best match of the entire tournament and I just can't wait to watch it.  Okada is gonna win and move on to the finals.

Sanada vs. EVIL

Part of me expected this match to happen.  I don't know why, but it's always a good match.  These two LIJ memebers and former tag champs together, have faced eachother two separate times in G1 tournament matches, and are currently tied at 1-1.  In the quarter finals they couldn't have had more of opposite matches.  EVIL ran through Yoshi-Hashi in a matter of minutes, and Sanada had to work from behind and deal with the outside interference of Yoshinobu Kanemaru.  Making it very clear to me that they are trying really hard to make Sanada look like the one you don't expect to win but he will.  As I mentioned in previous articles EVIL is a current 6-man tag team champion and probably isn't gonna get any huge wins right now.  Sanada is the the one who is the future star of LIJ right now.  He's the one I see in the world title picture in the near future.  EVIL is good, I don't ever see him as a world champion.  I mentioned earlier Hiromu has the brightest future, but he isn't there yet and thats true, Sanada has the brightest future right now.  I'm picking Sanada to win here, and we will get the rematch that we probably should have expected from day one, a rematch of the finals from last year, Kazuchika Okada versus Sanada.

Night 9, Finals

Kazuchika Okada vs. Sanada

This is the only match that I'm actually predicting will happen, I didn't want to do a series or an audio predicting the entire tournament because if I did that it would be very different from what actually happened and I felt it was easier to preview each night of the tournament before they happened.  With all of that said, this is the finals I expect, and Sanada needs to win.  It would not shock me at all if New Japan was like, "First tournament back, Okada wins.", that would bother me a lot but it wouldn't surprise me at all either.  That shouldn't happen at all.  The main event of Dominion needs to be Naito defending against Sanada, it establishes Sanada to the level that he deserves to be at, and Okada doesn't need to win everything to stay at the level he's been at for nearly a decade.  This is going to be a hell of a match and I hope Sanada wins.  Out of the four left I'd take anyone but Okada and be happy but I expect it to be Sanada.

So that's gonna do it for the New Japan Cup series of articles, I didn't want to do this in audio form because I didn't feel it for this series but I think this went well.  I'll probably do Audio to preview Dominion which is on the Twelfth of this month, as long as they announce a full card soon.  I hope everyone's enjoyed this series of writings.  Thanks for the support if you've been part of the few who have read the whole series.