Destiny 7.01.07: Who Is Number One In Japan? (Part 3 of 3)

Popularity Contest

In my mind the most important thing to consider when discussing which promotion is the “biggest” is the current popularity of the product. If you look at North American wrestling promotions in the same way that I took a look at the one’s in Japan, it seems fairly obvious to me that the NWA would have the stranglehold on the history category, but nobody would argue that the WWE is without a doubt the most popular wrestling product in North America today (or even the world) making it the “biggest”. That is precisely why I choose to focus my answer entirely on my findings relating to the subject of popularity. I was able to enlist the help of 411’s Matt Short, who lives in Japan for some insight into the popularity of Japanese wrestling. Here is what he wrote:

Until now I hadn’t really considered which company was bigger since
they get relatively the same amount of coverage in Puroresu Weekly. TV’s
kind of hard to factor in Japan because there’s almost NO wrestling on
basic TV, at least where I am. I’ve heard rumors from fellow students
about picking up NOAH in the next prefecture over but I can’t say for
sure. Most people aren’t going to have cable in Japan, that’s my
experience with it. So my guess would be that TV ratings really mean
jack in the grand scheme of things for New Japan and NOAH. They’re more
concerned about getting people to come to shows rather than watching
them on TV. Putting a Budokan show on PPV makes sense, they get revenue
from it, but live events (at least the NOAH ones I’ve been to) would be
pretty lacking as two hour wrestling shows for most people aside from
die hard puro fanatics. It’s mostly why they’re on cable. Basic TV has
to be fast paced with constant bright lights and Hard Gay shoving his
crotch in the face of some Korean pop singer. If you’re going to see a
wrestler on TV it’ll probably be Antonio Inoki and he’ll probably be
surrounded by 20 women and choking some comedian.

I kind of get the impression that cable is a big luxury for people here in
Japan. I’m not entirely sure how G+ works. They definitely charge for the finale of Navigations, but I’m not so sure about all the ones in between. It might even be a premium channel, the one place I’ve been to that had cable didn’t have
it.

Ah, so TV ratings aren’t that important? That sounds about right, since it seems fairly obvious to me that all of the Japanese promotions have been focused more on selling tickets than anything else including selling PPV’s. Until this year it seems that no Japanese promotion has really gone all out in the world of PPV. Only this year have All Japan and New Japan begun to run frequent PPV shows (I think they have done 3 or 4 this year, I’m not entirely sure). As far as television goes, there is only one show on a widespread broadcast TV Network. That show is run by New Japan and is on TV Asahi. TV Asahi is available in about many of Japan’s 47 prefectures, but all but 10 are run as individual networks who run TV Asahi programming and may or may not broadcast New Japan’s program. From my understanding the show is a 30 minute cut down version of their show World Pro Wrestling. I believe this can be compared to something like AM Raw, a short highlight show. If I’m mistaken about this, feel free to contact me and provide a link to information indicating otherwise. New Japan also has programming on cable channels Samurai TV and GAORA I believe (though I have never personally seen their GAORA program if it even exists).

All Japan’s TV situation is more consistent as they are a staple program on GAORA TV and Samurai TV. The “Banquet” TV show on GAORA is said to be very popular. It is a one hour show, usually pulling the best matches from specific, taped tour shows. They also have a broadcast TV show called “All Japan Mother” which airs on Chiba TV in the Chiba prefecture only. It is similar to the World Pro Wrestling show New Japan has in that it’s a 30 minute highlight show. All Japan appears to be the most ambitious in the PPV market as they are currently increasing their PPV output and in my honest opinion have had the best PPV’s of the last calendar year.

NOAH is an entirely different story in the world of television. All I know about G+ is what Matt wrote in his little input above. It seems like they run both free shows and PPV shows on the G+ network, which leads me to believe it has a different type of approach to it. Either way, when it comes to production value, they are right up there with New Japan at the top, which tells me that G+ is a quality TV channel. Aside from that, I know little about the TV situation with NOAH, but as has been made perfectly clear, TV ratings mean very little regarding popularity of a product in Japan considering the rarity of cable.

So, there you have it, a very broad look at Japanese wrestling television. It’s interesting that cable is considered a luxury in a nation that seems to have so much technology, but I also understand that everything costs an arm and a leg and that people spend much less time watching TV than they do here. I guess it’s part of that thing we call culture and how they are all different. Having discussed TV leaves us with the most important study, who is drawing the most fans to their shows. I actually went back through the records of attendance and did some mathematics. I also learned that New Japan and All Japan often work the attendance for their big shows while typically NOAH does not, although they did slightly work the numbers for their Dome shows in 2004 and 2005. I’m going to go through the attendance figures for 2006 for each company, but before I do that, I want to give an overview of the general figures for 2004 and 2005. In 2004, New Japan ran more shows, drew more total fans and their average fans per show total was higher than both NOAH and All Japan. However, NOAH outdrew New Japan in the Tokyo Dome. New Japan ran 2 shows in the Dome that year with reported attendance numbers of 53,000 for the January show and 50,000 for the May show. The actual number for both shows was realistically about 48,000 and 45,000. In July that year NOAH ran the Tokyo Dome for the first time in their history drawing a reported 58,000 fans. All Japan did not run a show at the Tokyo Dome that year. In 2005, New Japan led the way in total shows, total attendance, and attendance average once again as it had done every year prior, but again didn’t draw as well in the Tokyo Dome as NOAH did. That year, New Japan ran three shows in the Tokyo Dome. The January show drew a reported 46,000 fans, the May show drew a reported 35,000 fans while the October show drew 38,000 fans. These were record low numbers for the promotion running in that venue. The actual numbers were around 5,000 less than reported. NOAH ran one show in July again and drew an impressive attendance of 62,000 fans. While this was impressive it did little to convince New Japan die hard fans that NOAH was approaching it in terms of popularity. This was the first time in the history of New Japan that another promotion was clearly outdrawing them, even though it was only in one category and one venue.

I went through all the numbers for 2006, a year that saw only one of these three promotions run in the Tokyo Dome and it only done one time and with record low attendance. As far as professional wrestling in Japan is concerned, it’s popularity is very low, and the only promotion that is obviously growing is All Japan who had seen record low numbers in 2004 and 2005 and in 2006 was finally seeing some turn around. If it hadn’t been for All Japan’s tough times, the numbers they are getting now would be considered extremely low compared to their past. It’s sad when the only promotion to have any obvious growth is only growing because it hit such depths that it had nowhere to go but up.

In 2006, All Japan saw growth for the first time likely since the split which created NOAH. Throughout the year they ran 100 shows total, the largest show being the Sumo Hall show which drew a reported 12,300 fans, far more than they had been drawing for their biggest show the previous couple years and a number greater than what New Japan had drawn in that venue in 2006. From those 100 shows, their total attendance for the year was 165,606 fans, which means they drew an average of 1,656 fans per show.

New Japan had a rough year in 2006. They were able to run more shows than their competition with 114 total shows throughout the year, but were only able to run the Tokyo Dome one time. That New Japan show reportedly drew 43,000 fans, but many at the event itself reported that the number was actually much lower and the guess by most was that it drew 30,000 fans. For the sake of argument I will include both of these in figuring my numbers. From New Japan’s 114 shows in 2006, they drew a total of 276,467 fans if the 30,000 fans for the Dome show is accurate. If the 43,000 fans for the Dome show is the correct number, New Japan drew 289,467 fans throughout the year. That makes their average attendance for each scenario 2,425 or 2,539 fans. I will go with the estimate actual attendance, but ultimately, as you will find out, it doesn’t matter.

NOAH saw a solid year, but one in which they were unable to run a show in the Tokyo Dome. The promotion that split from All Japan in 2000 ran a total of 99 shows in 2006. They had six shows at the Budokan Hall that ran in attendance in the ballpark of 16,000, give or take a few hundred depending on the show. The first one of the year drew 16,800 and would be their peak attendance for the year. For their 99 shows ran they drew a total attendance of 281,850 fans during the year. That gives NOAH an average attendance of 2,847 fans per show. I believe that if NOAH had decided to run the Dome that they would have again outdrawn New Japan in that venue.

A Look At Just The Numbers

Biggest Event

All Japan: 12,300
New Japan: 30,000
NOAH: 16,800

Winner: New Japan

Total Attendance

All Japan: 165,606
New Japan: 276,467
NOAH: 281,850

Winner: Pro Wrestling NOAH

Average Attendance

All Japan: 1,656
New Japan: 2,425
NOAH: 2,847

Winner: Pro Wrestling NOAH

Conclusion

I think I have covered just about everything and I must say the number tell an interesting tale. I think it’s no surprise or question that All Japan is a clear number three when it comes to popularity as they don’t really compete in any way. I almost don’t want to say who I think get’s the “411’s Destiny ICHIBAN” prize, because I think it’s fairly obvious. If the question were, “who is more important?” or “who is more influential?” I think there is little doubt that New Japan is the answer, but according to my numbers, if we’re talking about popularity, which most readers who asked this question were, the answer to “who is the biggest wrestling promotion in Japan?” would be Pro Wrestling NOAH. It was really shocking to me as I put these numbers together just how well NOAH did. I was expecting that my theory that NOAH is the top dog would be proved wrong, but alas, it turns out that when it comes to popularity, NOAH has the upper hand and it would have only gotten better if they had run in the Tokyo Dome as I have little doubt that they would have drawn as much or more than New Japan did. If New Japan had run a second Dome show they would have been somewhere in the same ballpark as NOAH, and would have surpassed them had they run the venue three times as they did in 2005. However, we can only base this on the circumstances that actually happened, and New Japan’s popularity is waning, thus they were barely able to run a single Tokyo Dome show. NOAH was probably better off having not run in that venue as well, as an empty arena with such a huge price tag is a risky financial decision and not one NOAH seemed to want to face.

Goodbye For Now