Suzuki-gun (translated as "Suzuki Army", the last part is pronounced "goon") was a Heel professional wrestling stable in New Japan Pro-Wrestling and Pro Wrestling NOAH. It's led by a legendary wrestler and mixed martial artist Minoru Suzuki, known for his penchant for brutality.
It was created on December 10, 2010 as Kojima-gun, led by the reigning IWGP Heavyweight Champion Satoshi Kojima and his newest cohort Taichi, fresh from his excursion to CMLL. On December 23, two more wrestlers have joined them: a known freelancer Nosawa Rongai and TAKA Michinoku from Kaientai Dojo. but at Wrestle Kingdom V Kojima lost the title to Hiroshi Tanahashi, but they were content to stick together for a while, adding the debuting MVP to their ranks in February to make up for Nosawa's temporary hiatus (he was accused of stealing a taxi).
Everything seemed to be going smoothly until May, where Kojima was defeated by his long-time rival Togi Makabe at Wrestling Dontaku. Taichi and Michinoku went into the ring after the match, but instead of trying to uplift Kojima's spirits, they attacked him. Kojima, however, was able to fight them off, only for Minoru Suzuki to appear from behind and put him into a sleeper hold. After Kojima passed out, Suzuki and his two new cohorts proclaimed that Kojima-gun is no more and Suzuki-gun has risen with a new leader.
Two weeks later, during the US Invasion Tour, Lance Archer made his debut and attacked Kojima only to be chased out by MVP, who's still loyal to Kojima and thus breaks away from the newly renamed stable. Archer joined Suzuki-gun the next day. Five wrestlers quickly started stirring up the established order of things by laying out everyone in their path, however, their championship ambitions were unsuccessful, even with Yoshihiro Takayama joining the stable in October 2011.
Their luck began to change in 2012, after they recruited Black Tiger in April, Canadian wrestler Harry Smith, later renamed Davey Boy Smith, Jr., in August and Kengo Mashimo in September. Smith and Archer formed the Killer Elite Squad (K.E.S.) and managed to defeat Tencozy (Kojima and his partner Hiroyoshi Tenzan) for the IWGP Tag Team Championship, being the first to bring gold into the stable.
After having dealt a decisive blow to Kojima, Suzuki-gun switched their sights onto CHAOS, after Mashimo was defeated by Shinsuke Nakamura while Suzuki gained a victory over Nakamura's newest protege and potential heir, Kazuchika Okada. Archer challenged Nakamura for the Intercontinental title on March 3, but was unsuccessful while Mashimo quit the stable. In April Suzuki confronted Okada, now a new IWGP Champion, and challenged him, but suffered defeat. After that, Michinoku announced Suzuki-gun has gained a new member, who was revealed to be Shelton Benjamin two weeks later. Archer and Smith managed to capture NWA Tag Team Championships later that day, adding more prestige to the stable.
However, the golden streak was short-lived, as KES lost the IWGP titles to Tencozy, Benjamin failed to take the IC from Nakamura and Suzuki lost to Okada in May. In Octobet, Taichi and Michinoku managed to capture IWGP Junior Tag Team Championships, but lost them to The Young Bucks after 26 days. In the same day, K.E.S. lost the NWA titles, but gained back the IWGP titles in a two-fall match.
At Wrestle Kingdom 8, K.E.S. lost the titles to Doc Gallows and Karl Anderson, now members of the Bullet Club. Suzuki became embroiled in a feud with Toru Yano and his tag team partner, Takashi Iizuka, culminating in a match on May 25, where Iizuka turned on Yano and joined Suzuki-gun. In June, Taichi was suspended for two months due to the news of him cheating on his wife becoming public, and in July, a half-Mexican (in Kayfabe) wrestler El Desperado joined the stable to become their newest Junior competitor. The Junior trio had mixed success, winning important matches but not bringing in any gold, while Suzuki has moved on to feud with Kazushi Sakuraba. K.E.S. recaptured the NWA World Tag Team Championships from Tencozy, while Suzuki and Sakuraba's rivalry culminated at Wrestle Kingdom 9, with Suzuki coming out on top. At the same event, the team of Iizuka, Benjamin, Archer and Smith was defeated by Yano and his new allies from Pro Wrestling NOAH, Naomichi Marufuji and TMDK (Shane Haste and Mikey Nicholls).
Incensed by this action, Suzuki-gun invaded NOAH on January 10, laying out the GHC Heavyweight Champion Marufuji, tag team champions TMDK and GHC Junior Heavyweight Champion Atsushi Kotoge. The stable switched its focus from New Japan to NOAH, with all eight members participating in the invasion. K.E.S. defeated TMDK in February to win GHC Heavyweight Tag Team Championships, while on March 15 Suzuki-gun made a complete sweep of the titles, with Michinoku and El Desperado capturing Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championships, Taichi winning GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship and Suzuki taking the GHC Heavyweight Championship from Marufuji.
The period of dominance in NOAH has begun, and Takayama, a NOAH original, broke off his ties from the stable. Everyone was united against Suzuki and his allies, trying to drive them off from the promotion, and for several months those attempts were unsuccessful. Eventually Marufuji challenged Suzuki with a dangerous stipulation: should he lose, NOAH would be dissolved. Finally, the streak was broken when El Desperado and Michinoku lost the Junior tag titles, and in December, Taichi lost the Junior Heavyweight Championship and Suzuki was defeated by Marufuji. But as the new champion was celebrating his victory, Takashi Sugiura turned on him and launched an attack, joining Suzuki-gun.
On January 31, 2016, Sugiura faced Marufuji for the GHC Heavyweight Championship and won with heavy interference from Archer and Suzuki, who also teased there was another traitor in NOAH, and as Suzuki was facing Go Shiozaki, Yoshinobu Kanemaru revealed himself as the newest member of Suzuki-gun by turning on Shiozaki. Kanemaru went to capture GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship from Taiji Ishimori in February. On May 28, K.E.S. lost their tag team championships to Marufuji and Yano, ending their 15-month reign, while Sugiura was defeated by Shiozaki. In July, Benjamin left the stable due to coming back to WWE, and at the end of the months, Sugiura recaptured his title from Shiozaki. The stable also made its return to NJPW, with Taichi and Kanemaru entering the Super J Cup, where Kanemaru advanced to the finals, but was defeated by the reigning champion KUSHIDA. In September, Kanemaru lost his title to Kotoge, while in October Sugiura was defeated by Katsuhiko Nakajima. This has turned into a downwards spiral for Suzuki-gun, where in the next two months they suffered numerous defeats, with K.E.S. losing their titles in December, and were gone from the promotion by the end of the year, with Sugiura cutting his ties with them.
On January 5, 2017, Suzuki-gun made its official return to New Japan, attacking the current champions with Suzuki hitting the Gotch-style piledriver on Okada, however, for the next two months their attempts to win championships were fruitless.
On March 6, Kanemaru and Taichi captured IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championships from Roppongi Vice (Rocky Romero and Trent Beretta), while Suzuki heavily interfered in the match between Zack Sabre Jr. and Katsuyori Shibata for Revolution Pro Wrestling's British Heavyweight Championship, helping Sabre win the championship. Following the match, Sabre joined the stable, bringing the title with him.
After this, Sabre began chasing Hirooki Goto's NEVER Openweight Championship, but failing, making Suzuki step up and defeat Goto, earning his first singles title in New Japan, while Taichi and Kanemaru lost their championships back to Roppongi Vice. Around this time, K.E.S. would begin a three-way feud for the IWGP Tag Team Championships with War Machine and Bullet Club's Guerillas of Destiny, eventually becoming champions in time for the World Tag League in late December. Wrestle Kingdom 12 saw Suzuki and K.E.S. lose their respective titles, with Suzuki in particular losing his trademark hairstyle as part of the stipulation he had in his rematch with Goto. He would quickly rebound by gaining the IWGP Intercontinental Championship from Hiroshi Tanahashi.
2018 would begin a breakout year for Zack Sabre Jr. as Suzuki-gun's ace, becoming the faction's most dangerous member next to Suzuki himself. He would become only the second foreigner to win the New Japan Cup, and would parlay it into an IWGP Heavyweight Championship match with Kazuchika Okada, only to fall. Both Suzuki and Sabre would represent the faction in the 2018 G1 Climax, but neither man reached far into their respective blocks. In this same year, Taichi would mark a jump to the heavyweight division of New Japan.
In 2021, Suzuki-gun would make an appearance in AEW, following Suzuki's debut for the promotion. In doing so, he re-invited Lance Archer back into the group.
In 2022 at the World Tag League finals, Suzuki announced that Suzuki-gun would disband at the end of 2022. The stable's final match, an eight-man tag-team match, between the members took place on December 23, 2022. With Archer returning primarily to AEW, the remaining full-time members went their separate ways albeit with some alliances still in play:
- Suzuki and El Desperado would form the "Strong Style" sub-unit with Ren Narita, the self-appointed "Son of Strong Style" due to his training under Katsuyori Shibata.
- Sabre would immediately be recruited by Shane Haste and Mikey Nicholls of The Mighty Don't Kneel upon claiming the NJPW World TV Championship at Wrestle Kingdom 17 (funnily enough, he got it by defeating the aforementioned Narita). He would later be dubbed the group's leader.
- Taichi, TAKA, Kanemaru and Douki formed the aptly-named "Just 4 Guys" stable after Wrestle Kingdom. They would gain a fifth member in SANADA, who resigned from Los Ingobernables de Japon to find his own identity with the newly-renamed "Just 5 Guys".
Tropes-gun ICHIBAN:
- Ax-Crazy: Takashi Iizuka was a barely controlled madman, violently attacking everyone in his path.
- Big Bad: Suzuki serves this role as the tyrannical leader of the stable.
- Eviler than Thou: Suzuki-gun is usually the most violent stable in New Japan, featuring almost none of comedic moments and silliness (like Bullet Club), bonds of brotherhood (like Los Ingobernables de Japon) or professional camaraderie (like CHAOS). Hell, Suzuki and Taichi going after Okada, CHAOS's leader who had previously positioned himself as the top heel of NJPW, was the initial catalyst to the years-long Heel–Face Turn arc for CHAOS as a group.
- Foreign Wrestling Heel: The stable features talent from outside of Japan, such as Zack Sabre Jr., Shelton Benjamin, Lance Archer and Davey Boy Smith, Jr., who were presented as amoral mercenaries allying with Suzuki and his violent methods.
- Evil Brit: Zack Sabre Jr., a violent British wrestler with a penchant for self-promotion.
- Hostile Show Takeover: From NOAH's perspective, Suzuki-gun showed up out of nowhere and wreaked havoc on the champions before destroying everything around and proceeding to dominate the title scene for months.
