AJPW Raising An Army Memorial Series 2024 - Korakuen Hall: WrestleFile Historical Verdict

Aoyagi retaining over Ayabe is the correct centerpiece for this stage of the Triple Crown story. Ayabe’s Royal Road victory made him a credible challenger, while a nearly thirty-minute defense gave the tournament winner a substantial title opportunity without ending Aoyagi’s reign after only one prior defense. The post-match direction toward Davey Boy Smith Jr. also gives the champion a clear next step.

Tachibana beating Abe gives the middle of the card a real consequence. Abe’s GAORA reign had two successful defenses, so the change does not read like an abandoned championship run. Tachibana’s win creates a fresh champion while making the October 17 Aoyagi-Abe non-title singles match an even more useful bridge into this card.

The Suwama anniversary match is booked as a career celebration rather than a protected victory. Letting Hideki Suzuki pin Suwama creates a result with substance, while Shuji Ishikawa and Shuji Kondo connect the bout to opponents and partners from different phases of Suwama’s career. The milestone has purpose without needing a ceremonial win.

The fifth match advances the All Asia Tag Team orbit by putting champions Rising HAYATO and Yuma Anzai opposite Davey Boy Smith Jr. and Dan Tamura in a six-man setting. Smith pinning Anzai establishes leverage without changing the belts. That is productive preview booking and gives the later title direction a factual result to build from.

The announced attendance of 1,296 is a material jump from the 337 fans at Shin-Kiba five days earlier and matches the card’s larger Korakuen ambitions. WrestleFile does not infer crowd reaction beyond the documented attendance, but the venue and number establish a substantially bigger presentation than the preceding tour stop.

The show is structured around two title matches and one anniversary feature. The GAORA change lands third, the Suwama milestone occupies the semi-main position, and the Triple Crown defense closes the card at 29:07. That hierarchy gives the event an intelligible progression instead of relying on one isolated attraction.

AJPW TV’s event-specific archive preserves the card as a single identifiable show. The official results page also records the Actwres Time pre-show separately from the seven numbered AJPW matches, which helps keep the core event chronology precise without pretending the pre-show was part of the championship narrative.

Match times also distinguish the features. Most of the undercard stays near the ten-minute range, Suwama’s anniversary receives 16:31, and Aoyagi-Ayabe nearly doubles that. The pacing signals exactly which programs AJPW wanted to carry the historical weight of the evening.

The Triple Crown defense is the event’s strongest historical anchor. Ayabe arrived as the Royal Road Tournament winner, Aoyagi recorded his second successful defense, and the match lasted 29:07. The combination ties a tournament result directly to the championship lineage and makes the main event important even without a title change.

Tachibana’s GAORA TV victory is the clearest permanent change on the card. He becomes the 27th champion, ending Abe’s reign after two defenses. Because AJPW’s official championship history documents the transition, the match has a straightforward place in the promotion’s title chronology rather than relying on retrospective interpretation.

Suwama’s twentieth anniversary gives the show a career-history marker independent of the championships. The match links him with Shuji Ishikawa while placing Hideki Suzuki and Shuji Kondo opposite them, and Suzuki scores the deciding fall. That result is more useful historically than a purely ceremonial multi-man tribute.

Taishin Nagao’s debut belongs in the record as an early-career marker. Ryo Inoue defeated him by referee stoppage with a Boston crab in 7:10. The bout is not a major attraction on its own, but debut matches gain archival value because later career development can be traced back to a specific first appearance.

Taken together, the title defense, title change, anniversary and debut make the October 22 Korakuen card a durable late-2024 checkpoint. It advances multiple threads without requiring WrestleFile to inflate every undercard tag into a major development.