As the Keiji Muto Retirement Road enters the home stretch, the final month of The Living Legend’s nearly 40-year career begins today with the final scheduled appearance of his iconic face painted/masked alter-ego, The Great Muta. First used early in Muto’s career when he competed overseas including in the US for World Championship Wrestling (WCW) and more recently revived occasionally for special appearances, the persona has always been a more heel/darker side of Muto famous for his colored mist sprays, each supposedly having a different effect. And some occasional fire breathing as his recent rivalry with Kenoh showed. For Muta’s final match, former WCW partner Sting will return to Japan for the first time in over 25 years, and All Elite Wrestling star Darby Allin will make his Japan debut as part of Muta’s team and will face off against famliar faces from Muta’s past-Hakushi, AKIRA & Naomichi Marufuji. There’s plenty more on the rest of the card including NOAH having a women’s match for the second time as Sumire Natsu & Maya Yukihi return to face Saori Anou & Jungle Kyona and much more, but of course it’s all about not the final Bye-Bye, but the final M****F**** BYE-BYE! It’s going to be a lot of fun.
Today’s event will be held at Yokohama Arena in Yokohama and can be watched LIVE on WRESTLE UNIVERSE in English only. It’s an ABEMA exclusive in Japan so Japanese audio will only be available on demand later. The event will also be available as a LIVE PPV on FITE in English for $19.99, which includes the live broadcast and unlimited on demand replays. While that’s a lot more than a month of WRESTLE UNIVERSE, it’s more convenient than signing up and then cancelling after paying around $7.50 for the rest of the month, and you essentially own a copy of the event to watch anytime (you just can’t download and watch offline). You will also be able to watch the first 3 matches FOR FREE on YouTube. If you’re staying up late in the US to watch plan on an all-nighter and load up on caffeine as I anticipate the event having a total running time of about 4 hours.
Today’s lineup:
Atsushi Kotoge & Seiki Yoshioka vs. Hajime Ohara & Hi69
Saori Anou & Jungle Kyona vs. Sumire Natsu & Maya Yukihi
Timothy Thatcher vs. Masaaki Mochizuki
Yoshinari Ogawa, Eita & NOSAWA Rongai vs. Junta Miyawaki, Alejandro & Yasutaka Yano
Jake Lee, Jack Morris & Anthony Greene vs. Masa Kitamiya, Daiki Inaba & Yoshiki Inamura
Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Hideki Suzuki in a GHC Martial Arts Rules match
AMAKUSA, Ultimo Dragon & Ninja Mack vs. YO-HEY, Kzy & Dante Leon
Kaito Kiyomiya, Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr., Takashi Sugiura & Satoshi Kojima vs. Kenoh, Katsuhiko Nakajima, Masakatsu Funaki & Manabu Soya
The Great Muta Final Match: The Great Muta, Sting & Darby Allin vs. Hakushi, AKIRA & Naomichi Marufuji
A couple hours before the event it was also announced that the full card for the Keiji Muto Retirement Event on 2/21 at the Tokyo Dome would be announced during today’s event.
Refresh the page occasionally for the latest results.
Updates below will begin at 12:15 AM ET/9:15 PM PT. The event is scheduled to begin at 1 AM ET/10 PM PT but the WRESTLE UNIVERSE stream is set to begin 45 minutes before.
9:15 PM PT UPDATE: The live stream has just started. Updates to follow when we go to the venue.
9:30 PM PT UPDATE: Live updates start now…
We are LIVE from Yokohama Arena in Yokohama, Japan. For now we only have low-volume but audible Japanese commentary. No English commentary yet, I’m guessing that’ll come on at start time when the FITE broadcast starts. Akitoshi Saito is a guest on Japanese commentary.
The paid attendance will be announced after the event. I’m not sure what the capacity limit is but vocal cheering is allowed and advance ticket sales seemed good. Based on the New Japan event earlier today and their draw, I’m thinking 4000-5000 will be good. It looks like at least 10-15% of the available seating is not available due to the layout so if it were full capacity, that’s probably somewhere in the 15,000 range (the venue’s normal capacity is 18,000).
A promo video plays for the main event. Afterwards commentary shows off some of the limited edition goods available today at the venue. Grab that Great Muta special edition 8-disc Blu-Ray box set for about 40,000 yen if you can! (around $300 US).
At 9:50 PM PT they show highlights of the New Japan/NOAH event earlier today. After this plays the Japanese commentary is fully muted on WRESTLE UNIVERSE.
At 10 PM PT/1 AM ET English announcer G-man welcomes us to the show as FITE joins in. Attendance-wise, the venue really filled up over the last 20 minutes so it should be a very good number.
The matches begin at 10:05 PM PT/1:05 AM ET. And now we have our English commentary. Your hosts are Stewart Fulton & Mark Pickering. Daisuke Harada joins Japanese commentary.
Match 1: Atsushi Kotoge & Seiki Yoshioka vs. Hajime Ohara & Hi69. 20 minute time limit
Result: Hajime Ohara & Hi69 beat Atsushi Kotoge & Seiki Yoshioka. Hi69 pinned Yoshika after Stuka Splash.
Mohammed Yone rotates in to Japanese commentary.
Match 2: Saori Anou & Jungle Kyona vs. Sumire Natsu & Maya Yukihi. 20 minute time limit
Result: Saori Anou & Jungle Kyona beat Sumire Natsu & Maya Yukihi. Kyona pinned Natsu after Jungle Buster.
Match 3: Timothy Thatcher vs. Masaaki Mochizuki. 30 minute time limit
Result: Timothy Thatcher beat Masaaki Mochizuki by submission.
The YouTube broadcast ends here.
Match 4: Yoshinari Ogawa, Eita & NOSAWA Rongai vs. Junta Miyawaki, Alejandro & Yasutaka Yano. 30 minute time limit
Result: Junta Miyawaki, Alejandro & Yasutaka Yano beat Yoshinari Ogawa, Eita & NOSAWA Rongai by DQ. Eita DQ’d. Ripping Alejandro’s mask off. They chased each other into the upper levels of the arena afterwards.
Match 5: Jake Lee, Jack Morris & Anthony Greene vs. Masa Kitamiya, Daiki Inaba & Yoshiki Inamura. 30 minute time limit
Result: Jake Lee, Jack Morris & Anthony Greene beat Masa Kitamiya, Daiki Inaba & Yoshiki Inamura. Lee pinned Inamura.
The 2/21 card for Keiji Muto’s retirement event is announced:
Masa Kitamiya & Daiki Inaba vs. Toshiki Inamura & Yasutaka Yano
Tokyo Joshi Pro Match: Miyu Yamashita, Rika Tatsumi, Shoko Nakajima & Yuka Sakazaki vs. Mizuki, Miu Watanabe, Maki Itoh & Yuki Arai (YES!)
Takashi Sugiura, Satoshi Kojima & Timothy Thatcher vs. Jake Lee, Jack Morris & Anthony GreeneEita, HAYATA, Daga, Yoshinari Ogawa & Chris Ridgeway vs. Atsushi Kotoge, YO-HEY, Seiki Yoshioka, Alejandro & Junta Miyawaki
MAO, Shunma Katsumata, Yuki Ueno & Toui Kojima vs. Tetsuya Endo, Hideki Okatani, Yuya Koroku & Takeshi Masada
Shun SKywalker, KAI & Diamante vs. Naomichi Marufuji, Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr. & Ninja Mack
Kento Miyahawa, Suwama & Yuma Aoyagi vs. Kenoh, Katsuhiko Nakajima & Manabu Soya
Intermission
NOSAWA Rongai Retirement Match: NOSAWA Rongai & MAZADA vs. Gedo & Taiji Ishimori
Kazuchika Okada vs. Kaito Kiyomiya (OH HELL YEAH!)
And finally…IT’S OFFICIAL! Keiji Muto Retirement Match…Keiji Muto vs. Tetsuya Naito! Heads-up…it’s going to be a PPV on ABEMA so may not be available outside Japan.
Match 6: Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Hideki Suzuki in a GHC Martial Arts Rules match. No pinfalls. Win only by submission or TKO. 30 minute time limit
Result: Kazushi Sakuraba beat Hideki Suzuki by ref stoppage (technical submission).
Match 7: AMAKUSA, Ultimo Dragon & Ninja Mack vs. YO-HEY, Kzy & Dante Leon. 30 minute time limit. They changed this last-second to Lucha Libre rules (no touch needed for tags).
Result: AMAKUSA, Ultimo Dragon & Ninja Mack beat YO-HEY, Kzy & Dante Leon. Mack pinned YO-HEY after a twisting corkscrew splash.
Match 8: Kaito Kiyomiya, Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr., Takashi Sugiura & Satoshi Kojima vs. Kenoh, Katsuhiko Nakajima, Masakatsu Funaki & Manabu Soya. 45 minute time limit
Result: Kaito Kiyomiya, Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr., Takashi Sugiura & Satoshi Kojima beat Kenoh, Katsuhiko Nakajima, Masakatsu Funaki & Manabu Soya. Wagner pinned Soya after a moonsault press.
Main Event: The Great Muta Final Match: The Great Muta, Sting & Darby Allin vs. Hakushi, AKIRA & Naomichi Marufuji. 1 Hour time limit
Result: The Great Mura, Sting & Darby Allin beat Hakushi, AKIRA & Naomichi Marufuji. Muta pinned Hakushi after Shining Wizard. They all then made their way to the back. The WRESTLE UNIVERSE/FITE broadcast ends here just before 1:30 AM PT, so just under 3 1/2 hours total.
The next event is 2/4 at Green Dome Maebashi in Gunma. There will be no live broadcast.
POST-SHOW UPDATE: The announced paid attendance was 8433. Depending on the exact available capacity that’s probably in the 75-80% full range. Excellent number and almost 3000 more than what the New Japan/NOAH event earlier in the day managed at the same venue.
It’s also been confirmed that 2/21 will be a PPV on WRESTLE UNIVERSE in English. If you are not a member/subscriber it will cost 5000 yen (roughly $38-40). If you are a member it will cost 4000 yen (around $30-32). Pre-orders begin Tuesday. It will be a PPV on ABEMA in Japanese.
