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 Kingdom 9
Wrestle Kingdom 9 also showcased a rivalry between Toru Yano and the Suzuki-gun group, which had been going on since 2013. In May 2014, Yano's tag team partner Takashi Iizuka joined Suzuki-gun, which led to Yano recruiting Kazushi Sakuraba as his new tag team partner to continue the feud. The rivalry lasted for the rest of the year, resulting in two Wrestle Kingdom 9 matches: one between former mixed martial artists Sakuraba and Suzuki-gun leader Minoru Suzuki, and a tag team match pitting Yano and a "mystery partner" against a Suzuki-gun team. The latter became an eight-man tag team match, with Suzuki-gun represented by Iizuka, Shelton X Benjamin, and the Killer Elite Squad (Davey Boy Smith Jr. and Lance Archer). Yano recruited three partners from the Pro Wrestling Noah promotion: Naomichi Marufuji and TMDK (Mikey Nicholls and Shane Haste).