Dramatic DDT

Well this was unexpected. Sanshiro Takagi appeared at today’s WRESTLE-1 event in Korakuen Hall to announce he was the new CEO of the company. W-1 head honcho Keiji Muto introduced him during the show and Takagi said he will be continuing his duties as president of DDT along with his new role. Takagi compared his position to Carlos Ghosn, the current Chairman and CEO of both Renault and Nissan.

Takagi gave a behind the scenes interview to explain the sudden news. There was a management shake-up in W-1 during March with many leaving their positions in “various circumstances”. Takagi attended the 1st April W-1 show in Korakuen Hall and got to see how it was run. He was amazed by the show and the response from the audience. Takagi’s goals for the company is to cut costs, improve merchandise and ticket sales and expand into rural areas.

Takagi’s role with W-1 is simply behind the scenes. He will not be wrestling for them nor will he play a character on their shows. There is no plan for DDT and W-1 to exchange talent. His job is to get W-1 to make a profit. The immediate challenge is to improve show attendences and box office numbers. On the plus side he thinks W-1 has a lot of young talent and a good roster after the company merged with Wrestling New Classic. Takagi hopes this decision will liven up the pro wrestling world.

Just to make things clear, I’m not going to be writing anything else on WRESTLE-1 anytime soon unless DDT is heavily involved with it. W-1 is still a seperate company and Takagi is only working with them behind the scenes. Unless something crazy happens and W-1 gets absorbed into the DDT family or there is a big angle where a DDT act invades, it won’t get much attention here.