Breath With The Switchblade
A new member was added to the title picture after Naito had regained the belt: Jay White. White was the leader of the Bullet Club who hadn’t seen any prominent gold in a hot minute. In the G1 Climax, Jay White defeated Naito in the B Block to move onto the finals where he was defeated by the winner of the G1 Climax 2019, Kota Ibushi. Naito had to then face White in a title match and at Destruction in Kobe, Jay White defeated Tetsuya Naito to win the IWGP Intercontinental Championship.
The Switchblade Era had picked up momentum once again as White held the title high over his head whenever he made an entrance. For his first title defense, White defeated Hirooki Goto at Power Struggle. From here on, things got complicated. Naito came out after the match and expressed his wishes to be a double champion holding both IWGP Intercontinental and IWGP Heavyweight Championships.
At the time, White was the IWGP Intercontinental Champion, Okada was the IWGP Heavyweight Champion, Ibushi was the G1 Climax winner and Naito was the number one contender for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship. Ibushi, Naito, and White all wanted to be double champions and so the Double Gold Dash. Okada was very against the idea however, a fan vote decided that one of these four wrestlers will emerge from Wrestle Kingdom 14 as a double champion. At Wrestle Kingdom Night 1, Tetsuya Naito defeated Jay White to win the IWGP Intercontinental Championship.
The Double Gold & The End Of The Intercontinental Championship
And on Night 2, Naito defeated Kazuchika Okada to win the IWGP Heavyweight Championship and become the first-ever Dual Champion in the history of NJPW. Right after Naito became double champion, he was attacked by KENTA who challenged for the title at The New Beginning in Osaka but was unsuccessful in winning the belts. Later, Naito was betrayed by EVIL after EVIL won the New Japan Cup 2020 and turned on Naito joining Bullet Club in the process. EVIL defeated Tetsuya Naito to become the second double champion.
EVIL received some backlash from the fans on his reign as champion. EVIL also became a triple champion and the first one in history after winning the NEVER Openweight Six-Man Tag Team Championship. Los Ingobernables de Japon was still after him and Hiromu Takahashi challenged for the titles but was unsuccessful. It was Naito’s Destino to take the titles back and that’s what he did. At Summer Struggle, Tetsuya Naito defeated EVIL to win the IWGP Intercontinental and the IWGP Heavyweight Championships.
Naito soon got occupied with EVIL where EVIL defeated Naito in B Block. This prompted a match between the two and soon at Power Struggle 2020, Tetsuya Naito successfully defended both IWGP Intercontinental and IWGP Heavyweight Championships against EVIL. WrestleKingdom soon arrived and a situation similar, but less complicated, to last year’s Wrestle Kingdom arose.
Kota Ibushi won the 2020 G1 Climax and earned the right to challenge for the belts at WrestleKingdom 15. However, Jay White had defeated Ibushi to take the briefcase off him and got the right to challenge for the belts. Now, at Wrestle Kingdom, Naito was going to defend both his IWGP Intercontinental and IWGP Heavyweight Championship’s on both nights. On the first night, he would be facing Kota Ibushi and on the second night the winner of the match would go on to face Jay White. At Wrestle Kingdom 15 Night 1, Kota Ibushi defeated Naito to win the IWGP Intercontinental and IWGP Heavyweight Championships.
On night 2, Kota Ibushi successfully defended both belts against Jay White. Ibushi soon expressed his wishes to unify the titles. On March 4, 2021, El Desperado faced Kota Ibushi for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship and the IWGP Heavyweight Championship and the winner would walk out with the new unified IWGP World Heavyweight Championship.
Kota Ibushi won the match, and that night, the IWGP Intercontinental Championship was retired and unified with the IWGP Heavyweight Championship.
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