donsem43

Match Link This is a 'Survivor Series' style tag with battle royal over-the-top eliminations as well. The World team gets off to a good start by being the more in sync team, which was surprising. They actually put over Viper strong as she pretty much takes out all of the Stardom women on her own, pinning Kyouga to get the first elimination. In the middle portion of the match they do a good job of giving the lower ranked women a chance to work some competitive sequences before getting eliminated. There is even some nice top rope teases before both Hojo and Santana get eliminated at the same time. Just a really fun match from start to finish, which is just what you want out of this type of match. ****

In the press conference for the show they announced that it was no-time limit, so I had a feeling that they were going to go around 30 minutes as that's the standard time limit for Stardom title matches. I imagine they were trying to protect Hojo in having them work that long so that it looked like it would have been a draw under normal circumstances.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efiCL-ZrQ_U This is a rematch of their match from last March for the then vacant World of Stardom Title. These two don't waste time going as they go right at each other right at the bell exchanging nasty strikes and holds. The middle portion of the match is really well done with focused offense from both women as well as some solid transitions to keep the action going back and forth. The match does go a bit long, (and that with some slight editing done to the TV version) as your left kind of waiting for them to pick it up toward the end. The finish itself leans away from the main part of the match as it turns into more a standard pro wrestling finish which is something they didn't really work earlier on. Still, this highly entertaining even while it overextends itself a bit. *** 3/4

The start and finish to the tag main was really fun. The opening sequence with Gable and Gotch was fantastic with Gotch trying a bunch of different thing to try and catch Gable but Gable is just too quick to get caught. The finish was just a lot of crazy stuff happening all over the place.

Match Link This is the return match for the controversial Yoshiko as she had been away from wrestling since the incident with Act Yasukawa last year. I liked the story that the match told. It was more about Yoshiko having to prove herself in order to move on with her life/career rather than trying to play off the past. Takahashi controls the early going of the match in such a way that it makes Yoshiko's comebacks seems earned. Finish does come a bit out of nowhere which was a bit of a jolt but didn't take away much from what they had built up to at that point. ***3/4

Dark Angel is probably better than any the other women mentioned in this thread, but I didn't nominate her because I never dug deep into her work in Mexico. During her run in Shimmer she was clearly the best worker there at that time.

Absolutely. I was going to make a comparison of Kana with Hotta/Kansai but why bother if people read it then think, "He just likes her more because she has nice tits!"

To me, both of these tie into a issue with Hotta's attitude in her approach to who she was working with. The '93 GP Finals is a clear example of this, in the semi-final against Harley Saito Hotta doesn't make any of effort to make any of Saito's offense come off as dangerous to her. At the finish Saito is throwing out a variety of suplexes for near falls to which Hotta sells them like they were simple rollups. Compare that to her performance in the final and there is a noticeable difference. She just has this high-school like quality as to when she deems her opponent worthy of her putting in any effort. No matter how many quality performances that I watch from her that belief is always going to eat away at my opinion of her. As to the Plum match, I cited it as an example of what I just stated. I should have given a better explanation as I didn't intend for it to come off as "This is the match that killed Plum Mariko!" In terms of being unique, I don't think that wrong, I just think that quite a few of her peers where more unique and certainly more memorable ways. Hotta's gimmick wasn't all that different from several similar gimmicks in men's promotions from around that time.

You'll want to check out her match with Megumi Yabushita from the Arsion 5th Anniversary show. They establish early on that Yabushita has the advantage on the mat so that forces Yoshida to change up her typical strategy. With Bull also I do think that she was a bit of a victim of timing career wise because by the time that she was on top she all of the stars above her had left. So while she was in her prime she had work with opponents that were still developing as workers but still managed to do a great job with what she had to work with.

It might be because I watched a few of his matches back to back but his offense became monotonous at a point. It just becomes "Well what type of suplex is he going to do and how far is going to through him." He doesn't put much, if any, reason or build into what he's doing he just starts doing it cause it's Suplex City time. He's a good entertaining wrestler but this is what keeps me from seeing him as great.

The wrestling business is crazy and terrible, but it seems to me like all business is kind of crazy and terrible. This is true with pretty much any corporate structured company. After tonight, this whole thing is starting to look more like a Stalin-like political purge with Raw being the weekly show trial.

Match Link Really fun vets vs. rookies match. Neat dynamic with the rookies as Watanabe is 15 but has close to two years experience while Kyouna is 24 but just debuted last November. Momo isn't the flashiest or most charismatic worker but she shows enough pluckiness in her work to get the crowd behind her. Jungle has a nice power moveset and amazing ring presence for someone with such little experience. Thunder Rock do a terrific job of setting up the rookies as underdogs then putting them over just enough to make you think that they have a chance at winning. Fun touch at the finish as Io hits a Hojo-style elbow for the win to lead up to their upcoming title match. *** 3/4

One of my current personal favourites. Works a fairly traditional joshi style but adds a nasty level of violence. Might not have the enough high-end matches to make my list but decided to nominate her just in case.

To me, the kick to the head after the camel clutch is where it starts. Plum messes up a few spots after that and immediately puts her hands up to her head. I've seen enough Plum Mariko to know that she's not that good at selling so there's something wrong. That doesn't stop Hotta from going after her head repeatedly. If your wondering why El-P would constantly dump on her all the time it's because of performances like this. Now, she has had great matches but when you watch a large enough sampling of her it comes off as mainly having to have the proper motivation more than anything. Personally, that makes her kind of Inoki/Hogan like and neither of those two are anywhere close to my list. Also, I'm really like stiff work. I love BattlArts/Futen and Arisa Nakajima is one of my favourite current workers. Nakajima will absolutely drill people but not in a reckless, uncaring way that Hotta would. Just the way that Hotta does it just rubs me the wrong way.

Had Brock on the bubble for my list so I watched his more recent stuff and now he's off. Basically a more mobile, slightly better selling version of Taz during his ECW Title run. Really needs someone like Cena or Reigns to bump and sell for him to give his stuff any real contextual meaning.

Seen way too many sandbag performances from her to even think of considering her. Hotta's pretty much useless after '96. Plus unprofessional bullshit like the Plum Mariko match on the ThunderQueen undercard. Honestly, go and try to watch that match with current knowledge of head injurys and how Plum died, you won't make it through it.

Starting with this week's show (3/12/16) they are doing a two camera mix. Plus they have added English subtitles to the promos.

Match Link This is quite the rockin' tag match. It goes 20 minutes but the pace is really well done. Its pretty action packed but still lets the action breathe which you typically don't see in joshi tags. Everyone here turns in a really good performance which is promising for upcoming matches. ****

If you've watched some of their matches/shows before, enjoyed them and want to try to follow the promotion on a regular basis? Then yes it's worth it. If you haven't watch them before and want to try it as a sample then I would hold off for now. They have yet posted any of their more hyped stuff from the last year or so it's better to wait till those match are available.

That's another problem with 80's AJW is that a lot of it isn't dated properly, if at all. If you get a bunch of TV from a tape dealer you usually get something listed as early '84 or summer '85, hardly anything with clear dates on them. Even some of the stuff that aired on AJW Classics was dated wrong.

Well after spending the afternoon looking, there isn't much of anything for 80's AJW footage, which is frustrating since there was tonnes a couple of years ago but pretty much all of that has vanished. I don't know if anyone wants to judge someone like Jaguar on just three matches with Galactica, the Lioness match, and a couple of tags with Devil vs. the Crush Gals. The only big Chigusa singles matches are the Devil Masami All Pacific title match and the first Dump hair match, that's it. If people want the links I'll post them but it's really just feels like scraps, not anything you can honestly judge someone on, especially if you haven't seen them before.

The problem with uploading stuff now is that a lot her matches from her peak were on Samurai TV, and that stuff gets taken down pretty quick nowadays. Her peak was also during the time that people considered joshi to be "dead" so that's another hurdle to overcome. But to me, she's the best female worker of her generation and maybe the most underrated overall. She was able to convincingly play the role of ace despite looking like a waifish model. Excellent at selling, surprisingly good matwork, and violent strike-based offense. Her 12/9/07 match with Kaori Yoneyama is fantastic and is what got me to look further into recent joshi. The 4/29/08 title switch with Kayoko Haruyama might be the most sound joshi match in history in terms of selling and psychology. Her run in the late 00's in JWP is just terrific and something I prefer over other's like Meiko Satomura and even some of the big names from the previous two decades.

How do people here feel about Veoh links? I haven't had any major issues personally, but I've read some who have had big problems and felt like I should ask first. That's the only place that has AJW Classics stuff online at the moment. Anything on YouTube/Dailymotion is off of TV and is a least a little bit clipped.

Handheld clips of the NXT Holy Grail.

Chigusa is going to be top 10 maybe even top 5. Rey will be about the same. Do need to watch more face Martel though.