donsem43
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Everything posted by donsem43
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I know that Stardom has too many belts as is, but after watching this match it really made me wish that they a title specifically for their younger wrestlers. Unfortunately, this is just a match for pride as both Watanabe and Kyona were both out of contention at this point. Momo had one of her best performances of the year here. She puts in her usual quality technical performance but also showed a very strong emotional side. Inversely, Kyona's biggest strength has been her ring presence, but in this match she also showed some pretty solid work in terms of execution. Great to see the less experienced Stardom girls get a chance to show what they can do in a longer match. ***3/4
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This is a tag match were the woman that gets the winning fall becomes the number one contender to Sonoko Kato's OZ singles title. With that stipulation, one would assume that this match would probably turn into a messy but that doesn't happen here. Actually, all four women incorporate the stip into the story of the match. There are some of the typical 'feuding partners' moments, but they don't overwhelm the action. Everyone here turns in a really good performance allowing the match to be much better than expected. ***3/4 -
This is Fujimoto's first title defense since winning the Infinity title a couple of weeks earlier. Tsukka has a really strong ace/veteran performance as she does a great job of selling Yukihi's offense to make her look like a threat, while also leading the way through the match to keep it from falling apart. Yukihi, who has only been wrestling for about a year and a half, does show her inexperience with some of her execution and selling but in other moments pulls off some impressive stuff. There is definitely a star quality about Yukihi, not just with her look but also with the way she carries herself and the ability that she shows in the ring. This isn't just a good match, but an interesting look at the future of Ice Ribbon. ***3/4
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On the 1/26/17 SEAdLINNNG show: Nanae Takahashi vs. Arisa Nakajima
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Considering the amount of women they've signed lately, or in the process of signing, they have to be doing something besides just a tournament. They have way too many women under contract now for their current structure but who knows what form a women's show would take. Maybe they move the women out of NXT and put them on a separate show.
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This match is held in a pub in London and my favourite thing about this match is that they use the environment that they are in to great effect. It gives the match a different feel as it feels more like a movie/TV bar fight with pro wrestling highspots. The match isn't very long but the way that they both throw out quite a few big spots to make it action packed. ***1/2
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This is a very fun, U.S. style tag match. The Owens twins are both solid here and do a good job of playing heels. Both of the Stardom women play good babyfaces. Timing their comebacks well and doing a strong job of keeping the crowd into the match the whole time. Entertaining stuff. ***1/2
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I don't know if she was ever on it. I know Kyoko Inoue was on for a few years but fell off. Aja Kong was the last joshi wrestler voted in and generally considered the last serious candidate from that era. I don't think anyone ever seriously discussed Kansai. If Sendai Girls keeps growing, which is weird to say about a promotion with just 5 wrestlers on its roster, I could see Meiko Satomura possibly building a case. It would probably be similar to CIMA where it's build as much on training and influence as much as drawing and in ring work. It's something to keep an eye on going forward.
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Found a couple more pics from the Kansai show. One is a better pic of Kandori and her awesome Christmas sweater, the other is something for old school JWP fans.
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The thing that really stuck out to me was her continuously trying to use English throughout the night. While Stardom World does market the use of English as a selling point, nobody on the roster outside of Hojo and Io even try to speak English. If she does sign with WWE, Io doesn't have a big personality, even though she carries herself a star extremely well, so promo are going to be more important to her. Asuka has been able to get by with being very animated both in and out of the ring, as it's clear she doesn't have a good enough handle on English to cut promos on a regular basis. It was interesting that Io seems to really want to work with Asuka again and also wants to work so gimmick matches like TLC. With the Kansai retirement, it occurred to me that she's the first big 80's/90's star to have retired while still working regularly since Lioness Asuka in '05. Devil Masami was only working sparingly when she retired in '08. That's pretty surprising that a lot her peers are still going and might have added to the appeal of this show. Some pictures from the show in the spoilers: In Ice Ribbon news, they set the semi-finals in the tournament for the vacant ICExInfinity title on the 12/31 show. One semi is a rematch between Tsukasa Fujimoto and Tsukushi, while the other is Risa Sera vs. Hiragi Kurumi. All four are pretty good, if not great workers, so it should be a pretty good show.
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Probably depends on the opponent more than anything. Syuri has had three MMA fights this year. The first two were against women still in their teens and the third was against a thirty year old from the Philippines who was only had one fight previously.
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This is a big title match as Ice Ribbon's "Ace," Tsukasa Fujimoto, attempts to regain the belt from recently crowned champ, Risa Sera. The story that they work through the match is Fujimoto having issues dealing with Sera's size and power advantage. This forces Tsukka to use her experience and try to maximize any opening that she gets during the match. Sera does a nice job working over Fujimoto's back in order to try a slow her down. The match does go a little sideways at the finish but it doesn't completely throw out what they had been working to before it. ***3/4
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Dynamite Kansai's retirement match will be on the December 11 OZ Academy show. Fittingly, her opponent will be Mayumi Ozaki.
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This is a super fun, if throwaway, midcard tag match. Everybody is just on here even if they don't try anything to ambitious. Kurumi looked especially good here as pulls out some nice looking athletic stuff to go along with some impressive power spots. Watching Tsukushi try and go straight on with a bulldozer like Kurumi was entertaining. ***3/4
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Ever since she regained the ICE Infinity title back in July from Risa Sera, Fujimoto had been running through the Ice Ribbon roster. While Tsukushi is only 19, she has over 6 years experience and isn't that far off from being a player at the top of the promotion. The match gets off to a slow methodical start as they work strike exchanges in between the two of them applying submissions. In fact, they rely a bit too much on strike exchanges as transitions in the early going. The match really picks up around the halfway point and is just fantastic the rest of the way. There are so many fun sequences that they work while still managing to tie them together and not let the match get too spotty. This goes to a draw which results in the title being vacated. ****
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This is your typical throw four big names in a tag match where everyone just does their own thing. Aja showing no interest in Kenta Kobashi's offer of a handshake before the intro's was awesome. I was most impressed with Matsumoto because this was a match based on star power and she managed to project herself as good as anyone else in the match despite being the least known name. Satomura does a nice job of selling getting worked over by her opponents along with solid performances from both Aja and Ayako. Just an all around quality tag match. ***1/2
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Forgive me as the dates are fuzzy but they were both in a group together, along with Io's sister Mio, called Triple Tails. That ended in late 2011 when Io decided to join Stardom. The big problem there is the Asuka had a very public falling out with Nanae Takahashi a couple of years earlier, and Nanae was Stardom's top star at the time. In addition to that, Io was arrested for marijuana possession while coming back from a tour in Mexico which came pretty close to ruining her career, (she was later clear.) That, plus Io's relationship with Nosawa, (who was also arrested at the same time,) seemed to cause a deep split between Io and Mio/Asuka. The two sisters did work together during Mio's retirement run, but Asuka wasn't on any of those shows. Granted, this is probably around the time that Asuka started negotiating/signing with the WWE so that might have played a small part. Mio's actual retirement was right around the time Asuka moved to Orlando. As far as I know that's the story, although I apologize if I "Scott Keith'd" anything. For Ice Ribbon, I would start with the 10th Anniversary show and go on from there if you can. Nothing that will knock will knock you off your feet but they are solid, entertaining shows. I'm definitely taking a "wait and see" approach with this Stardom reshuffling. Any time they've tired it before either someone gets hurt or leaves the company. Rossy Ogawa tried it in Arsion to and it was a big dud back then, but that was before Dragon Gate so who knows if it will be different now. Also, for upcoming stuff, Sendai Girls has Meiko Satomura vs. Aja Kong on the 11/23 show in a #1 contender match. Haven't been able to find out if the show is being taped or not. WAVE is running the semi-finals of their NEXT tournament on 11/27 with one of the semis being Misaki Ohata vs. Ryo Mizunami, which should be something with both have great years. Hopefully that gets uploaded to the WAVE Network although they have become inconsistent in uploading stuff again.
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The 11/3 Ice Ribbon show is a pretty good top to bottom show. I don't the main isn't quite the MOTYC that some have said, but it's still damn good. While she's only 18, Tsukushi is looking like she's ready to breakout as a top-level worker. Honestly, looking at the promotion as a whole, Ice Ribbon looks a lot more promising than Stardom does over the next year or two, that's even considering the chance that both Io Shirai and Kairi Hojo stay. Ice Ribbon just has a more complete roster with a few younger workers that have great star potential that are ready to break through.
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Match Link The first five minutes of this match are pretty much a squash by Hyuga. She just runs Haruyama right over and anything that Kayoko tries to do to stop or counter her ends up going wrong. Once she finally gets on offense, Haruyama goes all out to even the score. The best thing about the match is that after such a big, fast start neither one of them ever stop selling the effects of it the rest of the match. Towards the finish, Hyuga looks like she is about to wrap up the win until Haruyama hits a dropkick, chopblock style, to Azumi's heavily braced knee. Hyuga's selling of the knee is so good that you know that she would have won had she not been hit on the knee but at the same time Haruyama's huge win felt earned. A beautifully structured and worked match. Easily the most underappreciated joshi matches of all time. ****3/4
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This is the final of Pro Wrestling WAVE's tag league. Good lord, this is like if pro wrestling tried to be a demolition derby, just tonnes of body-on-body contact. There's a spot early on where Hashimoto grabs Yamashita along the ropes but Mizunami hits a clothesline on Rina so hard that Chihiro goes flying to the floor, that the type of match this is. Towards the end, it's hard to till if Mizunami is doing a Grade A sell job or if she is truly feeling beaten down. I know the phrase 'Hoss Fight' gets thrown around loosely but this match might be that in its truest form. ***3/4
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This match is literally women vs. girls as the Ice Ribbon girls are both still teenagers. I will give them credit as this match is really competitive. It helps that both Tsukushi and Kurumi can hit hard, especially Tsukushi since she is tiny. The story of the match is more that Avid Rival can out last the physicality rather than simply the case of them being veterans. A great match that ends up being different than what you would first think based on appearances. ****
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This was better then the more hyped WrestleMania three-way. The main reason being that their was a solid story being worked throughout rather than the constant chaining of spots that was the Mania match. Charlotte is in full on beast mode here. This was the most physical that I've ever seen her work as she just manhandling both Sasha and Bayley. Bayley took the brunt of the attacks from both Charlotte and Sasha to the point were I bought the finish of Charlotte just finishing her off with a kick after she pinballed off of Sasha. The Horsewomen continue their run of having very good, if not great, multiwoman matches. ****
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[2016-08-21-WWE-Summerslam] Sasha Banks vs Charlotte
donsem43 replied to Microstatistics's topic in August 2016
This match was laid out really well. It did a good job of chaining the spots together although you get the feeling of them working out the steps in their heads at times. Charlotte work on Sasha's back leading up to her Die Hard Kansai attempt was a highlight. The match did lack a sense of drama that the first Sasha win had and a rollup finish didn't help. Overall, it was a pretty good match but nothing that you need to go out of your way to see compare to what else these two have done. ***3/4 -
So this week in the Observer, not only is Hojo reconsidering but Io is to because she would blocked by Asuka. I'm sure it will be different again next week. The Nakajima/Kimura rematch for the JWP Title is up. Found the match to be disappointing. The things that really annoy me about Kimura show up, (shoehorning in her heel shtick, cutting off her opponents comebacks to soon,) plus she works like she just ate too much turkey at holiday meal. Arisa tries, but Kimura isn't as salvageable as Ozaki was earlier in the year