Shota Umino Retained the NJPW Global Heavyweight Title at Forbidden Door. Then Mox Showed Up.

By: Thom Fain

The IWGP Global title remains around Shota Umino’s waist after defeating PAC at Forbidden Door on Sunday night. Jon Moxley, his onetime senpai, showed up after to challenge Shooter. It’s exactly the kind of long-brimming storyline the annual intercontinental showcase has become known for.

Umino won a hard, physical match — eighteen minutes, a powerbomb over the top rope and through a table, a Running Lariat and a Paradigm Shift to close it — and was standing in the ring with his title when Jon Moxley’s music hit. The Death Riders came down but only as a prelude to Hiroshi Tanahashi, NJPW’s president and its most enduring modern symbol.

“The Ace” came down shortly after to chase them off, put the belt around Umino’s waist, and raise his hand. The image was pointed, with Tanahashi protecting the future of NJPW from the AEW machine that has taken so many stars from Tokyo these past six years.

The veteran stood between the young champion, and the man who helped create him.

Depending on who you ask, Mox made Shooter (or at least made a significant contribution). When Umino was still a Young Lion in the NJPW Dojo, Moxley lost a singles match to him at Dominion in 2019, saw something in the kid, and took him in and gave him his nickname. Umino absorbed Moxley’s style, his mentality, his finishing move. He was the original Death Rider before the Death Riders formally existed — a student fully shaped by his teacher.

Umino has since gone his own direction, stumbling through four years after the front office anointed him as one of the “Reiwa Three Musketeers”. Shooter has said publicly that AEW looks down on the IWGP and that it needs to change, making his victory against the otherworldly PAC a statement win.

New Japan and All Elite Wrestling appear set to continue their interwoven storylines following the conclusion of the June 28th PPV.