New Japan G1 Climax 2014

newjapang1climax2014

For the first time in the history of Puroresu Central, I reviewed every match from the 2014 G1 Climax. For those keeping track at home, there were a total of 111 singles matches in the 2014 G1 Climax, the most in the history of the tournament. So I picked one hell of a year to review every match. To help clear up space in the New Japan Reviews section, I am making this a landing page for reviews for all 12 days of the tournament. The brackets for the tournament were as follows, you can click on a wrestler's name to go to their profile on the site:

Block A: Block B:
Hiroshi Tanahashi
Satoshi Kojima
Yuji Nagata
Tomoaki Honma
Katsuyori Shibata
Shinsuke Nakamura
Tomohiro Ishii
Shelton Benjamin
Doc Gallows
Davey Boy Smith Jr.
Bad Luck Fale
Togi Makabe
Hirooki Goto
Tetsuya Naito
Hiroyoshi Tenzan
Kazuchika Okada
Toru Yano
Minoru Suzuki
Lance Archer
AJ Styles
Yujiro Takahashi
Karl Anderson

First, if you want to go straight to the reviews, you can find a full review of every event below:

- Day 1 on July 21st, 2014
- Day 2 on July 23rd, 2014
- Day 3 on July 25th, 2014
- Day 4 on July 26th, 2014
- Day 5 on July 28th, 2014
- Day 6 on July 31st, 2014
- Day 7 on August 1st, 2014
- Day 8 on August 3rd, 2014
- Day 9 on August 4th, 2014
- Day 10 on August 6th, 2014
- Day 11 on August 8th, 2014
- Final on August 10th, 2014

If there was a certain match you were looking for, here are the line-ups for all 12 days:

Day 1

Bad Luck Fale vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Doc Gallows vs. Shelton Benjamin
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Karl Anderson
Satoshi Kojima vs. Yuji Nagata
Minoru Suzuki vs. Toru Yano
Tetsuya Naito vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Hirooki Goto vs. Togi Makabe
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Tomoaki Honma
Katsuyori Shibata vs. Shinsuke Nakamura
AJ Styles vs. Kazuchika Okada
Day 2

Satoshi Kojima vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Bad Luck Fale vs. Shelton Benjamin
Hirooki Goto vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Lance Archer vs. Tetsuya Naito
Tomoaki Honma vs. Yuji Nagata
Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Shinsuke Nakamura
AJ Styles vs. Toru Yano
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Kazuchika Okada
Karl Anderson vs. Togi Makabe
Doc Gallows vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi
Day 3

Doc Gallows vs. Tomoaki Honma
Lance Archer vs. Karl Anderson
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Shelton Benjamin vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Tetsuya Naito vs. Toru Yano
Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Katsuyori Shibata
Bad Luck Fale vs. Yuji Nagata
Hirooki Goto vs. Minoru Suzuki
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Satoshi Kojima
Kazuchika Okada vs. Togi Makabe

Day 4

Bad Luck Fale vs. Satoshi Kojima
Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Shelton Benjamin
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Minoru Suzuki
Hirooki Goto vs. Toru Yano
Tomoaki Honma vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Lance Archer vs. Togi Makabe
Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Yuji Nagata
AJ Styles vs. Tetsuya Naito
Karl Anderson vs. Kazuchika Okada
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Katsuyori Shibata

Day 5

Doc Gallows vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Lance Archer
Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Satoshi Kojima
Minoru Suzuki vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Karl Anderson vs. Toru Yano
Katsuyori Shibata vs. Shelton Benjamin
AJ Styles vs. Hirooki Goto
Bad Luck Fale vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi
Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Tomoaki Honma
Kazuchika Okada vs. Tetsuya Naito

Day 6

Bad Luck Fale vs. Doc Gallows
Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Yuji Nagata
Togi Makabe vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Katsuyori Shibata vs. Satoshi Kojima
Hirooki Goto vs. Karl Anderson
Lance Archer vs. Minoru Suzuki
Shelton Benjamin vs. Shinsuke Nakamura
AJ Styles vs. Hiroyoshi Tenzan
Kazuchika Okada vs. Toru Yano
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Tomohiro Ishii

Day 7

Satoshi Kojima vs. Shelton Benjamin
Lance Archer vs. Toru Yano
Karl Anderson vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Doc Gallows
Hirooki Goto vs. Hiroyoshi Tenzan
Bad Luck Fale vs. Tomoaki Honma
Tetsuya Naito vs. Togi Makabe
AJ Styles vs. Minoru Suzuki
Katsuyori Shibata vs. Yuji Nagata
Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Tomohiro Ishii

Day 8

Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Toru Yano
Shelton Benjamin vs. Yuji Nagata
Doc Gallows vs. Satoshi Kojima
Hirooki Goto vs. Tetsuya Naito
AJ Styles vs. Lance Archer
Minoru Suzuki vs. Togi Makabe
Katsuyori Shibata vs. Tomoaki Honma
Kazuchika Okada vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Shinsuke Nakamura

Day 9

Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Tomoaki Honma
Lance Archer vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Doc Gallows vs. Yuji Nagata
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Togi Makabe
Minoru Suzuki vs. Tetsuya Naito
Bad Luck Fale vs. Katsuyori Shibata
Satoshi Kojima vs. Shinsuke Nakamura
AJ Styles vs. Karl Anderson
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Shelton Benjamin
Hirooki Goto vs. Kazuchika Okada

Day 10

Satoshi Kojima vs. Tomoaki Honma
Bad Luck Fale vs. Davey Boy Smith Jr.
Hiroyoshi Tenzan vs. Tetsuya Naito
Karl Anderson vs. Minoru Suzuki
Togi Makabe vs. Toru Yano
AJ Styles vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Kazuchika Okada vs. Lance Archer
Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. Yuji Nagata
Katsuyori Shibata vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Doc Gallows vs. Shinsuke Nakamura

Day 11

Shelton Benjamin vs. Tomoaki Honma
Toru Yano vs. Yujiro Takahashi
Hirooki Goto vs. Lance Archer
Karl Anderson vs. Tetsuya Naito
Tomohiro Ishii vs. Yuji Nagata
Doc Gallows vs. Katsuyori Shibata
Bad Luck Fale vs. Shinsuke Nakamura
AJ Styles vs. Togi Makabe
Davey Boy Smith Jr. vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi
Kazuchika Okada vs. Minoru Suzuki

Finals

Opening Eight Man Tag
Fale, Gallows, and Takahashi vs. Nagata, Nakanishi, and BUSHI
Suzuki, Iizuka, and Benjamin vs. Yano, Sakuraba, and YOSHI-HASHI
Cole and Bennett vs. Liger and Captain New Japan
KUSHIDA and Shelley vs. O’Reilly and Fish
Tetsuya Naito vs. Tomoaki Honma
Karl Anderson vs. Tomohiro Ishii
Katsuyori Shibata vs. Hirooki Goto
AJ Styles vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi
G1 Final: Kazuchika Okada vs. Shinsuke Nakamura

After the end of Day 11, here were the final results:

Block A: Block B:
Shinsuke Nakamura  [16]
Hiroshi Tanahashi  [14]
Bad Luck Fale  [12]
Katsuyori Shibata  [12]
Davey Boy Smith Jr.  [10]
Satoshi Kojima  [10]
Shelton Benjamin  [10]
Tomohiro Ishii  [10]
Doc Gallows  [8]
Yuji Nagata  [8]
Tomoaki Honma  [0]
Kazuchika Okada  [16]
AJ Styles  [16]
Karl Anderson  [10]
Minoru Suzuki  [10]
Tetsuya Naito  [10]
Hirooki Goto  [8]
Hiroyoshi Tenzan  [8]
Togi Makabe  [8]
Toru Yano  [8]
Lance Archer  [8]
Yujiro Takahashi  [8]

Now that we got the basics out of the way, since this is the first full G1 Climax I have reviewed, I was curious as to which wrestler got the highest match scores overall. So excluding the final just so everything is fair, here is how the wrestlers' ranked based on just their matches in the G1 Climax:

Block A: Block B:
Katsuyori Shibata 6.65 AJ Styles 6.7
Tomohiro Ishii 6.25 Kazuchika Okada 6.65
Shinsuke Nakamura 6.15 Hiroyoshi Tenzan 5.9
Hiroshi Tanahashi 6.1 Karl Anderson 5.7
Yuji Nagata 6.05 Tetsuya Naito 5.65
Tomoaki Honma 6 Hirooki Goto 5.4
Satoshi Kojima 5.9 Toru Yano 5.15
Davey Boy Smith Jr. 5.5 Yujiro Takahashi 5.1
Shelton Benjamin 5.3 Minoru Suzuki 5
Doc Gallows 4.9 Togi Makabe 4.85
Bad Luck Fale 4.4 Lance Archer 4.2

It is hard to compare the two block scores against each other since they wrestled different opponents, but comparing wrestlers within the same block seems fair. Block A had the better quality wrestlers so the scores were obviously higher overall. Nothing too surprising except maybe Tenzan doing so well, and overall the matches were definitely above average.

Hope that you enjoyed the coverage for the New Japan 2014 G1 Climax!!