WWE NXT: Getting To Know The Six Men In The Ladder Match by Christopher Jeter

After winning the New Japan Cup tournament, Zack Sabre Jr. is one of the hottest wrestlers on the planet right now, and it’s no surprise that NJPW has reportedly decided to make an even greater commitment to ZSJ.

Tetsuya Naito, Kota Ibushi, SANADA, and Hiroshi Tanahashi. Those are the names that Zack Sabre Jr. vanquished en route to a shocking New Japan Cup victory, as he put together a performance for the ages in the month of March. Sabre Jr. then followed that up with a sensational match against Kazuchika Okada that earned 4.75 or 5 stars among most wrestling reviewers.

Of course, ZSJ wasn’t successful in his bid for the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, but the fact that he received this opportunity and shined against Okada was huge. The match itself was an exhibition in wrestling magic, which is what we’ve come to expect from ZSJ’s bouts. After all, this is a man whose wrestling prowess is held in such high regard that Daniel Bryan has said that Sabre has even surpassed him as the greatest submission-based wrestler of this generation.

ZSJ has the full support of NJPW right now, and the Wrestling Observer News’s JJ Williams tweeted that Sabre Jr. has signed a full-time contract with the promotion.

ZSJ has signed a full time NJPW contract so that's his number one priority at this time. — JJ Williams (@JJWilliamsWON) April 7, 2018

Williams adds that NJPW is now Sabre Jr.’s “number one priority” after signing this deal, and this explains why The Technical Wizard has been dropping titles over WrestleMania weekend. Sabre Jr. lost the EVOLVE championship to Matt Riddle, and he also lost the RevPro title to the equally magnificent Tomohiro Ishii.

With Sabre Jr. now a bigger part of NJPW and with several high-profile matches under his belt as the New Japan Cup winner, it will be exciting to see what the promotion decides to do with him going forward. They don’t half-ass their pushes, especially with a 30-year-old rising star who can lay claim to being the best technical wrestler on the planet.

Sabre Jr. is special, and for as much as I’ve gushed about his wrestling ability, his improvement as a promo cannot go unnoticed. He managed to unnerve some people in Mexico after a heel promo, and his crusade against warm beer alone makes him a hero.