On January 4, 2017, at Wrestle Kingdom 11 in Tokyo Dome, Evil, Bushi and Sanada won a four-team gauntlet match to become the new NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag Team Champions.[15] They lost the title to Hiroshi Tanahashi, Manabu Nakanishi and Ryusuke Taguchi the next day,[16] before regaining it on February 11 at The New Beginning in Osaka.[17] In March, Evil made it to the semifinals of the 2017 New Japan Cup, before losing to Bad Luck Fale.[18] On April 4, L.I.J. lost the NEVER Openweight 6-Man Tag Team Championship to Hiroshi Tanahashi, Ricochet and Ryusuke Taguchi in their second defense,[19] before regaining it on May 3 at Wrestling Dontaku 2017.[20]