New Japan Pro Wrestling has officially announced the full roster for this year’s G1 Climax tournament, which kicks off in Hokkaido, Japan on July 17th.
The reveal went off largely as expected, with many of the same names from 2016 returning. All the major players will be present including last year’s winner Kenny Omega, Tetsuya Naito, IWGP Intercontinental Champion Hiroshi Tanahashi and of course reigning IWGP Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada to round out the Top Four seeds. Michael Elgin will return for his third tournament, while Juice Robinson and Zack Sabre Jr. will be making their heavily anticipated G1 debuts. As reported several weeks ago, veteran star Yuji Nagata will be making his final appearances in his 19th tournament.
One very notable absence from this year’s G1 is Cody Rhodes, who made his debut with New Japan in January at Wrestle Kingdom 11. The former WWE Superstar was assumed to be a lock, especially considering that he will face Okada for the IWGP title at the July 1st special in Long Beach. That being said, there is one outside hire for this year’s tournament, and it’s the biggest news coming out of this morning’s reveal… The “Golden Star” Kota Ibushi is back!
Here’s the full list of names announced for this year’s G1 Climax 27. Final brackets should be announced in the next few days!
- Hiroshi Tanahashi
- Togi Makabe
- Michael Elgin
- Kazuchika Okada
- Hirooki Goto
- Tomohiro Ishii
- Toru Yano
- Yoshi-Hashi
- Kenny Omega
- Bad Luck Fale
- Tama Tonga
- Tetsuya Naito
- Sanada
- Evil
- Satoshi Kojima
- Yuji Nagata
- Juice Robinson
- Minoru Suzuki
- Zack Sabre Jr.
- Kota Ibushi
For those unfamiliar with the G1 Climax, it is a month-long round robin tournament that takes place in Japan every year featuring all the top stars of New Japan and, on occasion, invited names from outside promotions. The competitors are placed into two blocks of ten, and by the end of 18 shows wrestlers will have faced off against every star in their block. Winning a match awards two points, while a time limit draw awards one, and of course losing awards zero points. At the end of the series, the wrestlers with the most points in each block will face off against one another in the G1 Finals to determine who earns the right to wrestle in the main event of the annual January 4th Tokyo Dome show.
