Post by bgski on Aug 21, 2018 11:06:57 GMT -8
I'm a bit late on this but I just came across this info while researching NOAH for my own personal reasons.
Apparently it was reported by WON or Wrestling Observer Newsletter that Hideo Itami who is signed with WWE and is on their 205 brand is going back to his home promotion that he along with the legendary Mitsuharu Misawa, Kenta Kobayashi and Jun Akiyama along with a number of other talents from All Japan Pro that included , Takeshi Morishima, Naomichi Marufuji and Kenta Kobayashi and even though there were a number of other guys, the ones I named along with NOAH's own product in Go Shiozaki helped make NOAH in the the dominant promotion in the early 2000's.
While this one going on they eventually became affliated with another growing company in ROH and had a nice working agreement which would see talent being exchanged from both sides culminating for ROH having Morishima become their only Japanese champion who showed his dominance. One of the matches that stood out was when Bryan Danielson aka Daniel Bryan ended up getting a detached retina do to the stiffness of Morishima.
While Morishima was dominating ROH, Kenta Kobayashi who changed his name to just KENTA so people wouldn't get confused with him and d Kenta Kobashi rwould also make his way to ROH numerous times and although he didn't aquire the same success there as Morishima, he did have a number of stand out matches while also helping NOAH remain dominant in Japan. Below are some highlights from one of his matches with a few known names whom ironically are all in WWE now.
NOAH would bring in Kensuke Sasaki later on but before he became a full time wrestler for NOAH he had created his own promotion in Diamond Ring or Kensuke Office who NOAH basically looked at as their own developmental program but Sasaki would make appearances in NOAH and eventually helped keep them atop of all Japan...some even say his match with Kobashi is one if not the best matches in up to that point the short history of NOAH.
Back to Itami though. Now Itami came in WWE with alot of hype but injuries would sideline him off and on throughout his tenure with them which as a fan of has been a bit of a let down but there have been circulating rumors that WWE is looking for a Japanese outlet of sorts and even though !mpact is affiliated with them currently, that agreement is said to be almost over with and as mentioned above from WON Itami is supposedly going to be coming back to NOAH very soon which indicates that WWE is looking to be working with NOAH at some point but also it could be only for a one time ordeal?
Although the report states that he is set to come back for an event on August 29th which is said there is no event that day but there will be one on Sept 1 which celebrates Naomichi Marufuji's 20th when asked by a fan the man or rather hoping it wasn't a working relationship with WWE, the man himself answered from his twitter.
It's more likely to be a one off. The anniversary show is the 1st September, and Noah have a working agreement with IMPACT.
— Hisame (??\Pro-Wrestling Noah in English) (@hi5ame) June 21, 2018
— Hisame (??\Pro-Wrestling Noah in English) (@hi5ame) June 21, 2018
And on the same day in regards to the report, Itami stated...
I don't know what source this is from, but rather than a working agreement it's more likely to be about KENTA returning for Marufuji's 20th. There is no announced show for the 28th August.
— Hisame (??\Pro-Wrestling Noah in English) (@hi5ame) June 21, 2018
— Hisame (??\Pro-Wrestling Noah in English) (@hi5ame) June 21, 2018
Ironically I've been getting back into NOAH as of late and thanks one of the few I subsribed to on YT, almost if not all of an entire history of the KENTA vs Marufuji feud can be seen that is if you have a few hours to spare.
