Shingo Takagi Wins IWGP World Heavyweight Title At NJPW Dominion
Shingo Takagi is the new IWGP World Heavyweight Champion. He defeated Kazuchika Okada today in a shocking upset at NJPW Dominion to win the vacant title.
Following the victory, the new champion called out former champion Kota Ibushi as his first challenger. Ibushi had defeated Jeff Cobb in the night’s co-main event.
The title had recently been vacated by former champion Will Ospreay due to a neck injury. In the wake of Ospreay’s injury, the match between Takagi and Okada was booked for today’s Dominion show.
Technically, NJPW has separated the lineage of the current belt with the former IWGP Heavyweight title. This became official in March when Ibushi defended both titles successfully on NJPW’s 49th Anniversary show in March.
The 38-year-old Takagi is also a former 2x NEVER Openweight Champion, 1x Jr. Heavyweight Tag Champion (w/Bushi), and 1x 6-Man tag champion (w/Bushi & EVIL). He won the “Rookie of the Year” award in 2005 as voted on by readers of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter. Takagi vs Will Ospreay in the 2019 Best of the Super Juniors finals was voted Match of the Year by the same publication.
The finish of the match came not long after the 30-minute mark had been passed. Okada was in control at this point but Takagi countered a Rainmaker attempt into one of his own. After the two exchanged strikes for a period, Takagi hit a Death Valley Driver but then Okada hit a series of short-arm Rainmakers before missing a bigger version. Takagi then hit a Pumping Bomber Lariat for a near fall. He then hit a dragon suplex followed by a sliding elbow before landing Last of the Dragon for the win.
