donsem43

Cool fun fact: Kofi's win came a day before the 45th anniversary of Hank Aaron passing Babe Ruth's total for career home runs.

This is a big match for Mika Iwata as she challenges the reigning OZ Academy champ, Hikaru Shida. Iwata has been over shadowed a bit by her classmate Chihiro Hashimoto when it comes to her potential because she has been pushed in a more traditional way rather than being a phenom right out of the gate. But that potential shines pretty bright here as she has a fantastic performance taking on a veteran star. Shida has a really stellar performance here to hitting just the right tone of being the establishing that she's better than Iwata but leaving enough openings to give Iwata hope and not come off as dominating. Just a terrific match. ****1/4

The Momo Watanabe/Jungle Kyona match from this weekend is getting a lot of hype but this match here is the real joshi MOTY. Chihiro Hashimoto/Mika Iwata vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto/Sareee - Sendai Girls 2/3/19

This is for Beauty Bear's (Hashimoto & Iwata) Sendai Girls tag titles. It's rare to see smash mouth wrestling in joshi but holy hell do these four ever pull it off. In the first couple of minutes, you have Iwata trying to lay in shots into Sareee with her reward being Sareee drilling her so hard in the face that she gets a bloody nose. The rest of the half hour is a awesome mix of smack talk and stiff shots. Absolutely fantastic stuff that is a must watch. ****1/2

This is Mayu Iwatani's first defense of the WOH title that she had won in her recent trip to the U.S. The early part of the match has Mayu trying to go with Konami on the mat with very little success. This error eventual allows Konami focus on Mayu's recently injured knee but Konami grows a bit too confident by trying some flashier moves. This allows Mayu to get back into the match although she is noticeably slowed by the hurt knee. The finishing stretch is a tremendous mix of Mayu's high-spots and Konami's submission. An impressive mix of styles on display here. ****1/4

Stardom uploaded Momo Watanabe vs. Jungle Kyona match from last June to their YouTube page. One of the best matches in the promotion last year.

This is for Kagetsu's world of Stardom title and is a battle of Oedo Tai members. I'll be honest, I went into this without any real expectations mainly because of not being a fan of Oedo Tai in general. The way that this match was laid out was incredibly well done. They started out with some intense exchanges in the ring that spills outside leading to some actually good brawling, which is exceedingly rare in joshi. After that, you have some fantastic back and forth producing some nasty looking exchanges. Things do get a little messy in the final few moments but it doesn't downgrade the match as a whole. Tremendous stuff. ****1/2

This is for Chihiro's Sendai Girls title. Since Saree works for DIANA, a group that barely puts out any footage of it's shows, any match of her's that end up getting uploaded feels like a treat. This ends up being extra special since I personally think this is the best match that I've ever seen her have. It helps that Chihiro has a return to form here, as I think she sleep-walked through the second half of last year. The main part of this match has a tremendous mix of hard hitting and matwork. The finishing stretch has a nice mix of bombs being thrown but there are a few moments of iffy selling to. Still just a tremendous match that is the first 'Must Watch' joshi match of the year. ****1/4

Good lord, Hazuki tries to turn Starlight Kid into road kill here. She is just super stiff with Kid throughout the entire match. Kid moved around the ring really well here but had some issues pulling off some of her bigger spots. Super fun match. ***3/4

So Rhea out, Kay Lee Ray, Jazzy Gabert, and Viper in? I wonder since Triple H keeps talking about NXT being a third brand do they specifically keep the ex-indie, big name guys in NXT and try to directly go after the same audience that AEW is likely to have.

I actually liked their SHIMMER 100 match a little bit more, a real high-end performance from Eagles there. The title match on Vol. 34 vs. Ayumi Kurihara (remember her) was, imo, the best women's match in the U.S. till the Horsewomen run in NXT.

Go watch this! Madison Eagles is the best wrestler you've never heard off, much less seen.

My top joshi matches for 2018. Still need to catch up on some WAVE and Ice Ribbon while waiting for the year-end shows to get uploaded: Io Shirai vs. Momo Watanabe - Stardom (5/23) Meiko Satomura vs. Io Shirai - Sendai Girls (4/19) Misaki Ohata vs. Mio Momono - WAVE (3/18) Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Misaki Ohata & Hiroyo Matsumoto - SEAdLINNNG (2/9) Misaki Ohata vs. Arisa Nakajima - WAVE (2/12) Risa Sera & Maya Yukihi vs. Kyuri & Maika Ozaki - Ice Ribbon (2/12) Kagetsu vs. Utami Hayashishita - Stardom (9/1) Momo Watanabe vs. Jungle Kyona - Stardom (6/17) Command Bolshoi vs. Arisa Nakajima - PURE J (8/11) Jungle Kyona vs. Utami Hayashishita - Stardom (9/9) Riho vs. Shoko Nakajima - Tokyo Joshi Pro (8/25) Jungle Kyona & Natsuko Tora vs. Momo Watanabe & Utami Hayashishita - Stardom (11/23) Chihiro Hashimoto vs. Ayako Hamada - Sendai Girls (4/19) Io Shirai vs. Momo Watanabe - Stardom (2/18) Jungle Kyona vs. Konami - Stardom (8/26) Yoshiko & Rina Yamashita vs. Arisa Nakajima & Ayame Sasamura - SEAdLINNNG (9/5) Mayu Iwatani vs. Utami Hayashishita - Stardom (9/24) Arisa Nakajima vs. Rina Yamashita - SEAdLINNNG (10/3) Ayako Hamada vs. Mio Momono - WAVE (3/25) Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujinami vs. Ryo Mizunami & Akane Fujita - SEAdLINNNG (5/3) Io Shirai vs. Nicole Savoy - Stardom (2/4) Kagetsu vs. Konami - Stardom (8/18) Viper vs. Jungle Kyona - Stardom (4/1) Misaki Ohata vs. Rina Yamashita - WAVE (6/3) Misaki Ohata, Ryo Mizunami, & ASUKA vs. Rina Yamashita, Takumi Iroha, & Rin Kadokura - WAVE (6/17)

This is a battle between to J.A.N. (Jungle Assault Nation) teammates with Tora questioning her future in the unit. This story runs throughout this match with Tora looking to prove herself as someone who can hang with Jungle. Even when this match ends in a draw Tora doesn't seem like she's found any of the answers that she's looking for. An overall outstanding performance Tora in what is the best performance of her career so far. Jungle is amazing here to, which is something considering the year she is having. While it's not one of the best matches of the year, it's definitely one of my favourites. ****

Rhea Ripley/Deonna Purrazzo is a nice end cap to Rhea Ripley's early NXT UK run. Her matches vs. Dakota Kai, Toni Storm, and Isla Dawn were all worth watching, Hyped to watch her rematch with Toni at Takeover.

They could move Candace LaRae into the feud given her past issues with Baszler.

So do they add Kairi Sane to the Women's Title match because I don't see them doing heel vs. heel at a Takeover.

Another women in New Japan "debate"...

This is for Jungle's and Tora's Goddesses of Stardom tag titles. The main story throughout this match is the continuation of the Jungle/Utami feud. Every interaction between these two is fantastic. Natsuko Tora had possibly the best performance of her career in her first Korakuen Hall main event. Not crazy about the booking here but with that said this match could be the precursor to a run of very strong tag matches in 2019 for Stardom. ****1/4

This is for Watanabe's Wonder of Stardom title and the match that Iwatani asked for after winning the 5* Grand Prix the previous match. This is pretty much a slugfest from beginning to end. These two lay into each other while mixing in some big spots. Not quite the great match that you would expect between these two but very enjoyable none the less. ***3/4

This was Kagetsu's second title defense of the day as she takes on Shimmer champ Nicole Savoy. Savoy actually controls the opening part with a mix of matwork and power forcing Kagetsu to use more of her high-risk offense. I really liked the matwork here a lot. It's not smooth looking but the roughness of it made everything come off as earned. Savoy going back and forth between matwork and throws worked well because you felt like she was keeping Kagetsu off balance. The finish keeps this from being great as Kagetsu sprays mists in Savoy's face right in front of the ref leading to the end. Still, a entertaining match that will hopefully led to Savoy coming back to Stardom assuming that she doesn't sign some where. ***3/4

Misaki Ohata has been far and away the best woman in the world this year, which is bittersweet since she is retiring at the end of the year. Just a great mix of high-end singles and tag matches with a variety of opponents in both WAVE and SEAdLINNNG.

Meltzer is reporting that Ohno/Riddle will not be on TakeOver but taped for TV before the live show starts. Apparently due to the four matches already on the card will take up all of the allotted time.

This match is for the Beyond the SEA tag titles held by BORDERLESS (Yoshiko and Yamashita.) I hadn't been impressed at all with BORDERLESS so far as a team but they really clicked here and this was by far their best match so far. It doesn't hurt that Arisa puts in a tremendous performance here as she is slowly starting to put together another run of top quality performances. Sasamura is a K-Dojo trainee that showed some promise. Hopefully, she starts making tape on a regular basis. This is just a great main-event tag. ****1/4

This turned out to be the most surprisingly great matches in joshi this year. The lineup wasn't too inspiring mainly because Takase, while promising, is a rookie and Kizuki is pretty bad. It's seem like SEAdLINNNG has become the place where mediocre workers go to have good matches because Kizuki worked hard and stayed out of the way when she needed to. This actually turned out to be a traditional 1/4 vs 2/3 type of Japanese tag with everyone filling their specific role incredibly well. I hope Takase gets a chance to shine somewhere, whether it be Actwres girl'Z or somewhere else, because she can more than hang in there when paired up with veteran stars like Nanae and Mizunami. A fantastic tag that you should make sure not to skip over. ****