The IWGP World Heavyweight Title isn’t the only belt that changed hands.
Hirooki Goto became the new IWGP World Heavyweight Champion at The New Beginning in Osaka, but Tetsuya Naito and Hiromu Takahashi can celebrate with him as they are now the new IWGP World Tag Team Championships. This comes after a nearly year long quest of the duo going after the tag team belts.
Naito and Takahashi originally won the 2024 World Tag League tournament, but opted to fight each other instead at Wrestle Kingdom 19. They got their opportunity to compete for the tag team gold the following night at Wrestle Dynasty; however, The Young Bucks ended up stealing the match and becoming the new IWGP World Tag Team Champions.
But it didn’t take Naito and Takahashi long to capture the belts. In fact, this was Matt and Nick’s first title defense and they couldn’t beat the Los Ingobernables de Japon members! Being pros in the tag team division, Matt and Nick had moments in the match where it seemed that they would escape with the prestigious belts.
However, it took one mistake for Naito to come back and hit Destino on both brothers. He connected with another one on Nick and got the three count. The Young Bucks only kept the belts for 37 days. This is the first time that Naito and Takahashi had won the IWGP World Tag Team titles together. Naito has previously won them with SANADA.
As for the Bucks, does this mean that they’re done with New Japan? It would be shocking if they never returned to the promotion, but as of now, there’s no word on whether they will travel back overseas and return to AEW programming. Matt and Nick Jackson were definitely happy to return last month and deemed their big title win as a great moment in their long careers:
“I honestly didn’t think it would ever happen again. I also knew my family was smiling ear to ear. It was just a great moment for us.
“Our run in NJPW, as well as Ring of Honor, made us into the wrestlers we are, so going back for the first time felt like home. Felt great to be honest, a full circle moment for us. I’m grateful we got to go back and perform at the Dome quite possibly for the last time. Who knows? But it felt great.” Nick said on Undisputed.
Matt Jackson added, “I personally never thought we’d ever hold any titles ever again in Japan, so the moment it happened, it all kind of just hit me all at once. Knowing my wife Dana and our two kids, Kourtney and Zachary, were in the building to see it meant so much to me. I was happy to give them a core memory in Japan that they could think back at now that they’re no longer babies.”
“And I know it can sometimes be tough to be a Young Bucks fan with all of the gossip, rumors, and negativity that surrounds us even when we simply breathe, so it felt good to give those loyal fans a win for once. A nice dose of nostalgic positivity. I see some of the abuse those fans take just for supporting us. Their love and support don’t go unnoticed,” he said.
Congrats to Naito and Takahashi!