Wrestle Kingdom 9
Wrestle Kingdom 9 drew 36,000 fans to the Tokyo Dome, reportedly (accordingly to "Wrestleview.com" and the "Wrestling Observer Newsletter") the best attendance for a NJPW January 4 Tokyo Dome Show in 13 years. The event reportedly had 12,000 to 15,000 purchases in North America.
Wrestle-1
was Wrestle-1's inaugural event, which took place on September 8, 2013, at Tokyo Dome City Hall. On August 9, Wrestle-1 released the first partial card for the event, which revealed only the Wrestle-1 signed workers taking part in the event, but none of their partners or opponents. The event featured a women's match and the Japanese in-ring debut of Daiki Inaba. None of the other workers were revealed before the event, though Mutoh stated that TNA wrestlers would not be taking part in the event. The event aired in Japan on Gaora and internationally on internet pay-per-view (iPPV) through Niconico and Ustream. Tickets to the 2,500 seat arena were sold out the day they went on sale. Sports journalist Dave Meltzer wrote that this, coupled with AJPW's recent decline in attendance numbers, showed that "fans are taking group as the real future of All Japan rather than All Japan". The event featured outside participation from several freelancers as well as wrestlers from Big Japan Pro Wrestling, Dragon Gate, Michinoku Pro Wrestling, Pro Wrestling Zero1 and World Wonder Ring Stardom. Koji Kanemoto, René Duprée, Seiya Sanada and Zodiac, who were with AJPW prior to Mutoh's departure, but had not announced their affiliation with Wrestle-1, made surprise appearances during the event. In fact, Duprée, who took part in the main event, was still officially AJPW's reigning Gaora TV Champion at the time of the event. Duprée returned the title belt to AJPW three days after the event. Bob Sapp, who had appeared in several of the old Wrestle-1 events, made an appearance in a tag team main event with Mutoh. Kenta Kobashi, who had the previous March announced that he would be joining AJPW following his retirement in May, worked the event as a color commentator.
Wrestle-1 began running regular tours right after Hataage Sen; the first tour ran until September 22 and the second from October 6 to 14. Many of the outsiders taking part in the inaugural event became regular members of the Wrestle-1 roster with the exception of Bob Sapp, Fujita Hayato, Katsuyori Shibata, Kazushi Sakuraba and Masaaki Mochizuki. Though Wrestle-1 also did not have regular female wrestlers on its roster, each event included a women's match, featuring wrestlers such as Ryo Mizunami and Shuu Shibutani from Pro Wrestling Wave, Koharu Hinata, Makoto and Syuri from Wrestling New Classic, Hikaru Shida, Maki Narumiya, Risa Sera and Tsukasa Fujimoto from Ice Ribbon, and freelancers Akino and Hiroyo Matsumoto. Wrestle-1 sought to introduce an "openweight division", where its wrestlers would not be typecast as heavyweights or junior heavyweights, like in most Japanese promotions, but would be able to interact with each other across weight limits. On September 24, Wrestle-1 announced that Seiya Sanada had signed a contract to officially become part of the promotion's roster effective October 1. On October 6, Wrestle-1 held its first event in Korakuen Hall in front of a sold out crowd of 1,750. On October 18, Mutoh announced his semi-retirement from in-ring action, saying that in the future he would be concentrating on running Wrestle-1.