Keiji Mutoh Grand Final Pro-Wrestling "Last-Love"

Promotional poster for Keiji Mutoh's retirement match featuring Keiji Mutoh, Tetsuya Naito, Kazuchika Okada, Hiromu Takahashi, Kaito Kiyomiya and AMAKUSA

### Tagline(s)

Hold Out
Nosawa Rongai Grand Final de Lucha

## Information

### City

Tokyo, Japan

**Keiji Mutoh Grand Final Pro-Wrestling "Last" Love** was a professional wrestling event promoted by CyberFight's sub-brand Pro Wrestling Noah (Noah). It took place on February 21, 2023, in Tokyo, Japan, at the Tokyo Dome. The event aired on CyberAgent's AbemaTV online linear television service and CyberFight's streaming service Wrestle Universe. The event also featured wrestlers from Noah's sister promotions Tokyo Joshi Pro-Wrestling and DDT Pro-Wrestling, as well from outside promotions such as New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), All Japan Pro Wrestling and Dragon Gate.

The event was themed around the final matches of Keiji Mutoh, who was defeated by NJPW's Tetsuya Naito in the semi-main event, and by Masahiro Chono in the main event match. After the main event, Chono announced his own retirement. The event also featured the retirement match of Nosawa Rongai, who teamed with Mazada in a losing effort against Bullet Club (Taiji Ishimori and Gedo).

## Production

### Background

On June 12, 2022 at CyberFight Festival, Keiji Mutoh announced his retirement from professional wrestling. Afterwards, it was announced that Mutoh would take part in a trial series, under his regular gimmick and "The Great Muta" gimmick, with his final match taking place in the Tokyo Dome on February 21.

Considered one of the greatest wrestlers of all time, Mutoh is also one of the first Japanese wrestlers to gain an international fanbase. Mutoh was trained by New Japan Pro-Wrestling and made his debut on October 5, 1984 against future rival Masahiro Chono. Over the following years, Mutoh became one of the greatest wrestlers of all time, Mutoh is also one of the first Japanese wrestlers to gain an international fanbase. "The Great Muta" gimmick is one of the most influential in puroresu, emulated by many wrestlers. He eventually became one of the four wrestlers to win the three major championships of puroresu (AJPW's Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship, NJPW's IWGP Heavyweight Championship, and NOAH's GHC Heavyweight Championship). He is also one of the two wrestlers to hold the NWA World Heavyweight Championship, the AJPW Triple Crown Heavyweight Championship, and the IWGP Heavyweight Championship (the others being Shinya Hashimoto and Satoshi Kojima). He also held the Wrestle-1 Championship, making him a ten-time world champion. Between AJPW, NJPW, World Championship Wrestling (WCW) W-1 and NOAH, Mutoh has held a total of 23 championships.

The Great Muta was Mutoh's best-known gimmick, which he has wrestled as often throughout his career, switching back and forth between this alter ego and his real name since March 1989. He was originally billed as the son of Japanese wrestler Great Kabuki (unrelated in real life), who used a similar gimmick, but the connection is rarely mentioned nowadays. Like his father, Great Muta is a mysterious, manifestly supernatural character who distinguishes himself through his macabre looks and magical skills. His appearance is highlighted by his lavish, exotical entrance costumes, which are taken off to reveal a horrifically painted face, later replaced by an organic-looking mask after Muto shaved his head. Muta uses Muto's moveset with little variation (his version of the *Shining Wizard* is named *Senkou Youjutsu* ("Flash Magic") instead), though Muta tends to be much more aggressive and weapon-friendly. Muta can also spit green or red mist and plays mind games to distract his opponents. The Great Muta is the gimmick most fans in the United States know Muto for, as he wrestled as The Great Muta throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s for the NWA, and in his later stints in WCW. Others copied or modified some of the moves that he popularized or innovated, such as the *Shining Wizard*, *Moonsault*, *Muta Lock* and the *Dragon screw leg whip*. He took part in what was generally considered to be one of the bloodiest professional wrestling matches at the time against Hiroshi Hase, leading to the creation of the "Muta scale", which rates the bloodiness of matches relative to this one's 1.0 value.

### Storylines

The event featured professional wrestling matches that involved different wrestlers from pre-existing scripted feuds and storylines. Wrestlers portrayed villains, heroes, or less distinguishable characters in scripted events that built tension and culminated in a wrestling match or series of matches.

On June 12, 2022 at CyberFight Festival, Keiji Mutoh announced his retirement from professional wrestling. Afterwards, it was announced that Mutoh would take part in a trial series, under his regular gimmick and "The Great Muta" gimmick, with his final match taking place in the Tokyo Dome on February 21. On January 4, 2023, at Wrestle Kingdom 17 in Tokyo Dome, Mutoh made his last match in NJPW teaming with Hiroshi Tanahashi and Shota Umino to face *Los Ingobernables de Japón* (Tetsuya Naito, SANADA and BUSHI) in a winning effort. On January 21 at Wrestle Kingdom 17 in Yokohama Arena, Tetsuya Naito faced Kenoh in the main event. Following the match, Mutoh asked Naito to be he his final opponent in his retirement match, which Naito accepted the proposition by Muto, setting up the match for February 21. The following day, at The Great Muta Final "Bye-Bye", Muto wrestled his last match under his Great Muta persona, teaming with Sting and Darby Allin to defeat Hakushi, Akira and Naomichi Marufuji. On February 12, at Noah's Great Voyage 2023 in Osaka, Naito made a surprise appearance for Pro Wrestling Noah, confronting Mutoh who had arrived for commentating the the night's main event match, remiding Mutoh his title loss in a match for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship against Genichiro Tenryu on December 10, 1999 at Battle Final, before stating that their match would not be a grand work of art, as Mutoh envisioned.

At the same event, IWGP World Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada and Togi Makabe took on GHC Heavyweight Champion Kaito Kiyomiya and Yoshiki Inamura in a tag team match. Before the match started, Kiyomiya wanted to start the match with Okada, but Okada wouldn’t even look at him and let Makabe start for his team instead. During the match, Okada was wrestling Inamura until Kiyomiya came in the ring and attacked Okada by kicking him in the face which resulted in Okada retaliating, causing both Okada and Kiyomiya to brawl outside of the ring until the match eventually ended in a no contest. As Okada left the ring, Kiyomiya challenged Okada to a match only for Okada to return and to continue brawling with Kiyomiya until both men were pulled away by their tag team partners, officials and staff. A match was set between Okada and Kiyomiya for the Tokyo Dome on the following day, despite Okada refusing to face Kiyomiya. At Great Voyage 2023 in Osaka, Okada made an surprisingly appearance in Pro Wrestling Noah, laying out Kiyomiya with the *Rainmaker*, after he had successfully defended the GHC Heavyweight Championship against Jack Morris. Afterwards, Okada mocked Kiyomiya stating that if wanted against him, he would have had to address him as "Mr. Okada", before announcing that he would take the promoted match with Kiyomiya. Three days later, in the last press conference, before the event, Okada deliberately missed the press conference, leading to an angry outburst by Kiyomiya, who immediately left the conference. The two had previously faced before as part of "inter-promotional" rivalry between NOAH and NJPW, with Kiyomiya teaming with Keiji Mutoh in a losing effort against Okada and Hiroshi Tanahashi and Kazuchika Okada in the main event of Wrestle Kingdom 16 on January 8, 2022, with Okada criticizing Kiyomiya following the match.

The "inter-promotional" rivalry between NOAH and NJPW, also featured a match between the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion Hiromu Takahashi and GHC Junior Heavyweight Champion AMAKUSA. At Wrestle Kingdom 17 in Yokohama Arena, after Takahashi defeated Hajime Ohara as part of KONGOH's and *Los Ingobernables de Japón* rivalry, GHC Junior Heavyweight Champion AMAKUSA challenged IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion Takahashi to a match, in a post-match interview, which Takahashi quickly accepted, eager to prove the superiority of NJPW’s junior heavyweights. Initially announced the following day as a potential title match, the match could had instead become a "special singles match", had not Takahashi successfully defended the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship against Yoh on February 5 at The New Beginning in Sapporo.

The event also featured the retirement match of Nosawa Rongai. On October 16, 2022, Rongai announced that he would retire from professional wrestling on February 21, 2023. His decision came to doctor's order to end his career, after his physical condition had progressively worsened over the course of his career. On January 22, it was announced that Rongai would team with his Tokyo Gurentai stablemate Mazada to face Bullet Club (Taiji Ishimori and Gedo) in his last match.

## Event

### Preliminary matches

The event started with three pre-show matches broadcast on Noah's YouTube channel. In the first one, GHC Tag Team Champions Masa Kitamiya and Daiki Inaba picked up a victory over Yoshiki Inamura and Yasutaka Yano in tag team competition. Next, a dispute between wrestlers from Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling took place with the team of Yuka Sakazaki, Miyu Yamashita, Shoko Nakajima and Rika Tatsumi defeating MIZUKI, Maki Itoh, Miu Watanabe and Yuki Arai. The last pre-show match saw Good Looking Guys (Jake Lee, Jack Morris and Anthony Greene) outmatching Takashi Sugiura, Timothy Thatcher and Satoshi Kojima.

The first match of the main event saw HAYATA, Chris Ridgeway), Yoshinari Ogawa, Eita, and Daga defeating Atsushi Kotoge, YO-HEY, Seiki Yoshioka, Alejandro and Junta Miyawaki. Hayata and Ridgeway still held grudges against Ogawa as they were still number one contenders for Ogawa's and Eita's GHC Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship at the time. Next up, a clash between DDT Pro-Wrestling teams took place in the fifth match of the night. The37Kamiina (MAO, Shunma Katsumata, Yuki Ueno and Toui Kojima) picked up a victory over Tetsuya Endo, Yuya Koroku, Hideki Okatani and Takeshi Masada in eight-man tag team action. The sixth match saw Naomichi Marufuji, El Hijo de Dr. Wagner Jr. and Ninja Mack defeateing Dragon Gate's Z-Brats (KAI, Shun Skywalker and Diamante). Next up, KONGOH (Kenoh, Katsuhiko Nakajima and Manabu Soya) defeated All Japan Pro Wrestling's Kento Miyahara, Suwama and Yuma Aoyagi.

The eighth match represented Nosawa Rongai's retirement match in which he teamed up with his old Tokyo Gurentai stablemate and tag team partner Mazada to fall short to New Japan Pro Wrestling's Taiji Ishimori and Gedo of the Bullet Club. The ninth and tenth matches portraited confrontations between singles champions of both Noah and NJPW. In the first one, the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion Hiromu Takahashi defeated GHC Junior Heavyweight Champion AMAKUSA, bout succeeded by the confrontation between IWGP World Heavyweight Champion Kazuchika Okada and GHC Heavyweight Champion Kaito Kiyomiya solded with the victory of Okada.

### Main event

As it was scheduled from weeks before, the event was planned to have a single main event match in which Keiji Mutoh was expected to face Tetsuya Naito. The bout concluded with Naito's victory, ending a long-term competition between the two wrestlers originated from Naito's looking for Muto since his debut. However, after the match ended, Muto challenged old rival, fellow Three Musketeer and former nWo Japan stablemate Masahiro Chono who joined the commentary table to a short match and even nominated NJPW referee legend Tiger Hattori who was also sitting ringside to officiate the bout. The match concluded with Chono's win which occurred after executing his signature STF hold for the victory.