Over the past few years, the hierarchy of Recent Japan Pro Wrestling has change into loads more well-known. Company legend and former IWGP Heavyweight Champion Hiroshi Tanahashi has been the President since December 2023, Gedo has been the pinnacle booker for nearly 15 years, and Takaaki Kidani, the Director of NJPW’s parent company Bushiroad, has even appeared on AEW television in recent times. Nonetheless, it appears that evidently a long-time roster member has began to transition right into a more powerful role backstage.
In line with a recent report by Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful Select, former IWGP Tag Team Champion Toru Yano has taken on a more necessary role in NJPW. The role wherein Yano currently occupies doesn’t technically have an official name as he reportedly dabbles in a bit of little bit of every little thing, including helping Gedo with the general booking of the corporate. Gedo doesn’t appear like he can be stepping down from his head booker position anytime soon, but several NJPW talent told Fightful that Yano has enough responsibility backstage to have enough power to influence some booking decisions.
Very like Tanahashi, Yano continues to be working full-time in NJPW, and is currently having fun with his seventh reign as one-third of the NEVER Openweight Six Man Tag Team Champions, this time holding the titles with Master Wato and YOH after previously holding the titles with the likes of The Briscoes, Tomohiro Ishii, and Tanahashi over time. Yano primarily wrestles in tag team matches, with only one in all his last 120 matches being a one-on-one contest. Nonetheless, that stand alone singles match was a marathon DDT Extreme Championship match with Super Sasadango Machine that lasted over two hours. While Yano is not exactly within the fundamental event scene in NJPW, he shows no signs of retiring anytime soon, despite taking over a more necessary role backstage.