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SANADA (2018)

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SANADA’s year began extremely well at Wrestle Kingdom 12, when he and his partner EVIL defeated the Killer Elite Squad to become the IWGP Tag Team Champions. It was SANADA’s first time holding an IWGP championship (his only previous title wins in NJPW had been for the NEVER Six-Man titles, which he held three times in 2017), but he had his eyes on an even bigger prize. The following night at New Year Dash he was involved in a 10-man tag team match between his unit Los Ingobernables de Japon and CHAOS, which LIJ won. After the match was over, Naito picked up Okada- the man who he had failed to defeat for the IWGP Heavyweight Title less than 24 hours earlier- and quite literally handed him over to SANADA to the shock of the crowd. This gesture was essentially Naito giving his blessing to his stablemate to step up as Okada’s next challenger. Okada however wasn’t so keen on this idea without getting something in return, which resulted in a rare IWGP Tag Team Title match at Korakuen Hall on February 6th (the first such title match at Korakuen since Killer Elite Squad retained against Shinsuke Nakamura & Tomohiro Ishii on April 5th, 2013). EVIL & SANADA similarly kept their belts against Okada & Hirooki Goto, with EVIL pinning Goto for the win. But SANADA would come up short in his quest to dethrone Okada, losing to the Rainmaker on February 10th in Osaka, albeit in a gutsy performance. Despite ultimately losing, the feud did result in a bit of character development for the Cold Skull, as frequent taunts from Okada to speak up did finally result in a strong verbal rebuke. We would end up hearing more from him throughout the year than we ever had before (though still very little of course).

SANADA kept his focus on singles competition even while reigning as one-half of the tag team champions, next participating in the New Japan Cup. He would defeat Chuckie T (a late injury replacement for his Best Friends partner Beretta) in the first round and follow that up with another win over comedic rival Toru Yano in the second, before falling prey to the ultimate winner Zack Sabre Jr. in the semi finals. Still, this result was a bit of progress for him, as in his first NJC in 2017 he was eliminated in the second round.

Following the NJC SANADA’s attentions turned back to the tag team titles, as he and EVIL were sucked into a larger feud with Suzukigun that also involved their two units’ leaders. With Naito and Suzuki battling it out over Suzuki’s Intercontinental Title, at the same time the Killer Elite Squad wanted their tag title rematch. Both matches happened at Wrestling Hinokuni on April 29th, and the ungovernables would walk out victorious with both titles. EVIL & SANADA had successfully retained after a bruising battle.

But just as it seemed like the tag team champions were unstoppable, they ran into a (strangely tiny) brick wall: the Young Bucks, who had recently moved up from the junior tag ranks to that of heavyweight. The Bucks challenged the champions at Dominion in June, and ultimately their experience as a team was too much for the champions to overcome, as they lost their titles. A rematch on July 7th in San Francisco would see the same result, as the Bucks once again defeated SANADA & EVIL.

Having been effectively vanquished (for now) in the tag division, EVIL & SANADA both turned their attentions back to singles wrestling with the G1 Climax just around the corner. SANADA found himself in a stacked B Block but after stumbling out of the gates against Hirooki Goto in his first match, he rattled off three straight victories to put himself right in the thick of things. The last of those three came over Kota Ibushi in his hometown, and SANADA declared the city to be his favorite in all of Japan to an enormous reaction. He would take note of this and use it again in the future, to the point where by the time the third or fourth different city had been declared as his “favorite in all of Japan” a disgusted Jushin Thunder Liger on commentary said something to the effect of “He always says that!”.

SANADA’s G1 winning streak would be ended by new IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kenny Omega, and he would disappointingly lose 4 of his last 5 matches to end up with 8 points overall (the exact same point total he finished with in 2016 & 2017, in fact). One of those losses came in his first ever match against LIJ leader Tetsuya Naito in Yokohama, a memorable encounter that saw SANADA take his boss to the limit before ultimately being defeated.

The next few months for SANADA were pretty quiet until he and EVIL reunited to enter the World Tag League in November. Seeking to defend their crown from 2017, they put up a strong 10-3 record to make it back to the finals, where for the second straight year they defeated the Guerillas of Destiny (now the tag champions after they beat the Young Bucks a few months earlier). But even though they succeeded in winning back-to-back World Tag Leagues, a straight up 2 vs. 2 tag team title match at Wrestle Kingdom 13 wasn’t in the cards for them. Instead, those damn Young Bucks inserted themselves yet again immediately after the WTL final, and demanded to be added into the title match. SANADA and EVIL were strangely fine with this, pointing out that it was a chance for them to get revenge on the team who had beaten them twice this year. It remains to be seen whether or not this is a case of excessive hubris on their part.