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What’s the story?
New Japan Pro-Wrestling, the #1 wrestling promotion in Japan and arguably the #2 company in the world behind WWE, was voted the Wrestling Observer Newsletter’s Promotion of the year for 2017.
This win marks the sixth consecutive year that NJPW has won this award.
In case you didn’t know…
This award recognizes the promotion that has the best year overall in terms of critical and commercial success, and how much people talk about that company throughout that given year. In a nutshell, it goes to that promotion that does the best job of putting on good performances and shows on a consistent basis throughout a calendar year.
The award has gone to different promotions over the years depending on each promotion’s success when compared to others.
For example, WWE won this award in 1999 and in 2000, which were years that many people consider to have been the company’s best ever in terms of industry significance, popularity, and commercial success.
Other success stories include: NOAH winning in 2004 and 2005 despite the MMA boom in Japan, AJPW in 1990-1991 during the rise of Mitsuharu Misawa, and UFC during the MMA explosion of the mid-to-late 2000s.
NJPW, meanwhile, has won this award every year since 2012 which, incidentally, was around the same time that Kazuchika Okada started being the company’s top wrestler and Gedo took over the company’s booking.
The heart of the matter
NJPW was unanimously voted the winner of this award, taking over four times as many votes as first runner-up Ring of Honor. WWE was a close third, but unfortunately, didn’t produce anything strong enough for the readers of the Observer to consider them worthy of even the second spot.
What’s next?
NJPW continues to grow as a company in terms of profit and popular appeal. The promotion is already making significant inroads into the North American market thanks to partnerships with the likes of Ring of Honor (ROH).
As further proof of this, Wrestle Kingdom 12, the company’s flagship program, hit a record number of foreign ticket sales, and many of their specials in the United States sold out in minutes.
This shows that NJPW is experiencing an extended growth in popularity that could soon have them competing directly with WWE in terms of fans. That might in itself be a good thing, because competition spurs greater effort in WWE, as seen with the Monday Night Wars.
Author’s take
It shouldn’t surprise anyone that NJPW won this award. Thanks to a combination of Gedo’s booking, excellent character work from a myriad of different wrestlers and acts, and the company philosophy of providing something for everyone while still taking wrestling seriously, NJPW continues to have both critical acclaim and commercial success.
They’ve cemented themselves as the #2 company from perhaps a revenue standpoint, but from a pure wrestling standpoint, they’re far ahead of the number one in the world.
I for one am staying optimistic that NJPW continues this trend into 2018 and beyond, and that their continued success will spur other companies to at least emulate their successes in some way.
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