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Ibushi never said that, he said he wants to work with New Japan until he retires and it will be "the last place" he works but that wasn't alluding to him being done when his current contract is up. It was more of a "hey, I'm sticking around so you can give me some belts, don't worry about me going to AEW".
They tried to push him as Tanahashi 2.0 but the fans shit all over it, culminating in a fan vote on which match the fans wanted to close the show, getting his Tokyo Dome main event with Okada bumped down the card and being replaced by Tanahashi and Nakamura for the IC title.
He hasn't really been a focus of the booking so he has cooled off a little (the year long Jericho feud had him sitting on his hands most of the time because Jericho is never there) but he's still the most popular guy in all the fan polls, to the point where Tokyo Sports gave him a "Best Technician" award of all things because they couldn't justify giving the top MVP award to him when he hadn't really done anything.
Naito draws better than either guy when they're not there and he is, you can see it better if you just look at the Korakuen Hall shows. Nights with just Naito always have better attendance than nights with just Okada or just Tanahashi.
I prefer Okada honestly, and Naito is only my third favourite guy in LIJ, but domestically he is the most popular guy they have.
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