Kadaveri

Candy matches I thought were really good: 1. Candy Okutsu, Cutie Suzuki & Dynamite Kansai vs. Devil Masami, Mayumi Ozaki & Plum Mariko - JWP 5/30/93 2. Candy Okutsu & Devil Masami vs. Kaoru Ito & Suzuka Minami - JWP 7/31/93 3. Candy Okutsu & Hikari Fukuoka vs. Etsuko Mita & Mima Shimoda - AJW 6/3/94 4. Candy Okutsu & Devil Masami vs. Cutie Suzuki & Takako Inoue - AJW 8/24/94 5. Candy Okutsu & Devil Masami vs. Cutie Suzuki & Hikari Fukuoka - JWP 3/17/95 6. Candy Okutsu, Cutie Suzuki, Mayumi Ozaki & Sumio Toyama vs. Devil Masami, Dynamite Kansai, Hikari Fukuoka & Hiromi Yagi (1 count rules) - JWP 3/21/95 7. Candy Okutsu, Devil Masami & Hikari Fukuoka vs. Cutie Suzuki, Hiromi Yagi & Mayumi Ozaki - JWP 10/31/95 8. Candy Okutsu, Devil Masami, Hikari Fukuoka & Ran Yu-Yu vs. Cutie Suzuki, Dynamite Kansai, Kana Mizaki & Plum Mariko - JWP 3/9/97 9. Candy Okutsu & Dynamite Kansai vs. Devil Masami & Jaguar Yokota - JWP 6/15/97 10. Candy Okutsu vs. Yumi Fukawa - Arsion 2/18/98 11. Candy Okutsu vs. Mariko Yoshida - Arsion 12/8/98 - Best Candy performance 12. Ai Fujita & Candy Okutsu vs. Ayako Hamada & Mika Akino - Arsion 4/14/99

I was reading an old Observer looking for something else, and noticed this paragraph where Dave Meltzer says that the 1998 WCW Georgia Dome show was set to sell out before the Goldberg vs. Hogan match was announced, so it wasn't really that which was the draw. He doesn't go into any more detail though. Has this been explored in more detail anywhere else? Was WCW just so hot then it didn't really matter who was in the main event? Excerpt below.

If you're up for killing two birds with one stone, here you go: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x92c02c

Ozaki does have some high end brawls post-prime, as recently as the Mio Momono matches in 2023-24 anyway. But yes those rare high points are surrounded by a lot of crap.

If folks in 2036 collectively decide that the previous generations were wrong to leave an 80s/90s wrestler off the Top 100 then they absolutely should be able to do that. In fact, I'd be a little disappointed if that didn't happen with at least 1 wrestler. Re-evaluations and challenging pre-existing narratives are a big part of GWE. Also it's not just about previous generations getting it wrong, what if a load of new footage surfaces that changes perceptions of a wrestler? For example, Carlos Colon has missed the Top 100 every time, but we're missing most of the most of the first 15 years of his career. It's not beyond the realms of possibilty that between now and 2036 a bunch of 70s Carlos Colon matches get found, he looks amazing, and people go "we need to vote for him this time".

So on the nominations process: I think part of the disagreement over this stems from a difference in opinion over what the main purpose of GWE should be, and how important the final list actually is. The two extreme ends of the spectrum are: 1. The purpose of GWE is to poll harcore wrestling fans on who they think the greatest wrestlers ever are. It's basically a survey done every 10 years. So the emphasis should be attaining as large and broad a base of voters as possible voting for whoever they want, so long as they are serious wrestling fans in order to create a list which represents the views of wrestling fandom at that moment. 2. The purpose of GWE is to facilitate a process where serious fans can explore, discuss and debate the merits of pro-wrestlers, and in the process improve our collective understanding of this medium. The final list isn't really that important. It's really about the engagement and elevated discourse that it generates, so having barriers to participation is a positive because it imposes a minimum level of engagement on everyone. I'm not saying those two philosophies necessarily represent anyone's opinion, more that we all fit somewhere in the spectrum in between. Wherever you decide to balance things, there are going to be upsides and downsides to it. Now for me, I do think there should be a nominations process. That's not to say that I think we should keep things the same next time, there were certainly some flaws that we should talk about now so whoever's running the 2036 itteration (inshallah!) can hopefully make wiser decisions (though who knows what the internet will look like by then). I think the biggest mistakes this time round were more down to the lack of clear communication of how to participate, what the rules are etc... It wasn't really until the last few months that we actually got a team (or 'committee' as it was later called) to actually organise things, till then everything was just being done by Grimmas by himself, which in practice resulted in a lot of stuff just not being done because he's just one guy with a job and family and it was never feasible that he'd effectively run a project like this by himself. Not meant as a personal criticism of anyone, just an analysis of what happened imo. I think the next generation should strongly consider having a committee sorted out a year in advance, make decisions on how it's going to be run and delegate tasks to each other and make sure they don't end up in a situation where everything just grinds to a halt if one person becomes inactive. There is also the problem of the rules we made being inconsistently enforced, but to me that's far more a problem stemming from organisational failures than the system itself. The rules really were not complex or difficult to enforce. We just did a sloppy job. The Greatest Match Ever Project has similar rules and has managed fine. The positives of having a nominations process are: 1. It's an effective way of facilitating people writing about the wrestlers. Sure, it didn't happen in every thread, but we still have hundreds of wrestlers on this forum with threads with multiple pages of posts. They're a great resource for anyone wanting to find out more about a wrestler's GWE case and wants something a bit more thoughtful than just looking at their CageMatch entry. If someone looking at the lists in 2030 or something is perplexed as to why a wrestler was voted the 83rd greatest ever, they have a very easy place to go read to find out why. I just don't think that resource would have been produced if we didn't enforce nominations. 2. Kinda related to point 1, it also just creates a list of wrestlers for people to check out. I've heard so many people talk about going through the List of Nominees for people to watch, see if they've forgotten anyone etc... 3. It also changes the ethos of the process into something that encourages long-term participation from individual fans beyond just turning up at the end of the 10 years and submitting a ballot. When you write up a nomination, or comment on someone else's nomination, you're honing your skills in thinking about and writing about wrestling. This might sound a bit pretentious but I think that also means you're becoming a better wrestling fan. I think helping to facilitate people doing this is a much more virtuous goal than making it as easy as possible for everyone to submit a ballot voting for whoever they want. 4. It puts up a modest barrier of entry. People who insist on voting for wrestlers who have not been nominated and wanting it counted just won't be able to participate. I think that's puerile behaviour. Either you haven't bothered to engage with the project in a meaningful way, or you've found out about it at the last minute yet are demanding that people who've been working on something for years change how it works just because you, a Johnny Come Lately, think you're so important. I'd rather such people just go away than try and cater to them. I think those 4 points outweigh the negatives that we have at the moment, basically that some votes ended up not being counted. But even that negative can be spun into an opportunity by telling people hey, here's a list of wrestlers who got votes but haven't been nominated. If you think they should be nominated, well, why don't you do it yourself! Then they will be nominated for next time. And if nobody cares enough to write a nomination for them then, well, to me that just sounds like their votes not being counted is an extremely minor detail indeed.

I just want to reply to this point specifically. I'm very frustrated at how neglected this forum has become lately, but I'm not an admin so there's not a whole lot I can do about it. It really shouldn't be so onerous to just sign up to an internet forum and start posting. I don't know the admins personally but it just feels like they've moved on from this place, and that's fair enough, but if the site isn't going to just slowly die there should be some kind of handover. This issue however is totally separate to the nomination process question, so I'll talk about that in my next post.

I think the highest ranked first timer will be Gunther. If not, possibly MJF.

Not that my ballot would have made much difference, but I will publicly confess that I didn't vote for Kikuchi simply because I forgot about him. He should have been in the 50-75 range. He's the best "undersized babyface struggling to make the hot tag" guy ever.

I didn't vote for her but I'm happy to see KAORU at #330 rather than totally missing the list like last time. Seems about fair. She was one of my favourites when I first saw GAEA Japan, mainly because I thought she must be legitimately insane.

It's actually super weird that Matt Riddle had a great rookie year in 2015-16, and then that turned out to literally be his in-ring peak.

We're talking about someone who didn't even make the Top 500 here. It doesn't really mean anything other than there's a few eccentrics in the world.

The simple reason why Ogawa has stuck around women's wrestling forever is because it's the only industry he has ever worked in. He doesn't know anything else. After 1997 he started putting on a suit and presenting himself as this serious businessman, but really he was a 19 year old wrestling nerd who went to shows, somehow got himself a paid job doing photography/office work for AJW and then just never left.

I am pretty fascinated by you ranking Toshiyo Yamada so high! Could you explain why?

I've followed much of her career in real time and have spent the last few months watching as much of her older stuff as I can find. My conclusion is Arisa Nakajima is the best Joshi worker to debut after 2000 and is easily making my Top 50. I still have a lot of sorting out to do on my list, but as of now I'd say she could land anywhere between 21-50. One of the weaknesses of her case is a lack of top top tier matches. It might partially be due to environment, it's not like Joshi worker who peaked after the mid-90s is really any better. One of the problems with the modern Joshi scene is (as well as there being less top tier workers in general) it's been splintered into a dozen promotions or so after the 2005 collapse so all the best wrestlers rarely work with each other, either because their promotions aren't working together, or if they are, politics gets in the way of having Top Star vs. Top Star matches. It's a shame for example that Arisa never had a singles match with prime Chihiro Hashimoto, Mayu Iwatani or Suzu Suzuki, and her one singles match with Io Shirai was a time limit draw which, although still really good, had an exhibition vibe to it. The huge strength Arisa has though is her consistency. She almost never has bad matches. That's why I've decided to make her case by providing a list of 100 matches covering her entire career. I'm not expecting many people to actually watch all 100, but the nice thing about her is you can just pick a bunch at random and, unless you just hate the style, I think you'll be impressed. There's plenty of good matches that aren't on this list as well, I'm sure some fans will be annoyed at me leaving off some of the Tsukasa Fujimoto singles matches, but I thought 4 of those was enough. Arisa debuted in 2006 for AtoZ, which is the promotion which trained her. However it closed down almost immediately afterwards and she moved to JWP. There's not much footage of her in 2006 (afaik this is the earliest footage of her) and it's mostly tag matches where she does little but get pinned so I've started at 2007. She got 'next big thing' hype already, being both far better than any of the other JWP rookies (see the match vs. Mayuka Nizeki for instance) and when she was put in the ring with veterans she was already having main event worthy matches. Her variety was also very impressive, for instance being able to have a quality matwork based match with Mariko Yoshida on 11/11/07, and then on 5/4/08 she's having a great barbed wire death match in the Mayumi Ozaki style, and then see 6/13/08 where she's put into a 30 minute draw and it's good stuff. The most famous moment from this early part of her career is her match with Yumiko Hotta on 12/28/08, mainly because of the entrance gateway spot, which got replayed over the years quite a lot. Shortly after this, Arisa would take a break from wrestling to - in her words - 'be a normal person'. She would return for JWP in 2012. As A Rookie 1. Arisa Nakajima & Azumi Hyuga vs. Meiko Satomura & Tyrannosaurus Okuda (Sendai Girls 10/5/07) **** 2. Arisa Nakajima vs. Yoshiko Tamura (JWP 11/2/07) *** 3. Arisa Nakajima vs. Mariko Yoshida (IBUKI 11/11/07) ***1/2 4. Arisa Nakajima vs. Mayuka Nizeki (JWP 12/9/07) **3/4 5. Arisa Nakajima vs. Haruka Metsuo (NEO 12/9/07) ***1/4 6. Arisa Nakajima & Command Bolshoi & Devil Masami vs. Azumi Hyuga & Dynamite Kansai & Mayuka Nizeki (JWP 2/10/08) ***1/4 7. Arisa Nakajima vs. Command Bolshoi (JWP 3/16/08) **** 8. Arisa Nakajima & Chikayo Nagashima vs. Bambi & Mayumi Ozaki - Barbed Wire Death Match (Hirotsugu Suyama Produce 5/4/08) ****1/4 9. Arisa Nakajima vs. Ryo Mizunami (Sendai Girls 5/23/08) ***3/4 10. Arisa Nakajima & Kana vs. Kaori Yoneyama & Leon (JWP 6/13/08) ***1/4 11. Arisa Nakajima & Pinky Mayuki & Yumi Ohka vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto & Io Shirai & Ryo Mizunami (JWP 9/23/08) ***1/4 12. Arisa Nakajima vs. Yumiko Hotta (JWP 12/28/08) ***3/4 Return To Wrestling 2009-11 were pretty dire years for Joshi so the scene was delighted to have a lost great hope return to the ring. I don't think she quite hit it out the park immediately, and some of her return matches she feels like a spare peg due to the layout (I left off some very good matches with her in because they don't showcase her well). The moment she really starts shining is when she becomes part of the feud with Emi Sakura/Ice Ribbon. She brought a level of heat and intensity to things that most of her contempories couldn't match. She'd get way better at this over time. The match on the 9/11/12 Kana Produce show is her best performance (and one of the best Joshi matches of that year). I'm not as big a fan of the 12/24/12 Emi Sakura fan as some other people, I felt it got a bit too bloated, but I've included it because it's very important for her career and I still think it's good. 13. Arisa Nakajima & Manami Katsu vs. Leon & Rabbit Miu (JWP 5/20/12) ***3/4 14. Arisa Nakajima & Hikaru Shida vs. Command Bolshoi & Hikari Minami (JWP 7/28/12) ***1/2 15. Arisa Nakajima vs. Emi Sakura (JWP 8/12/12) ***1/2 16. Arisa Nakajima & Command Bolshoi vs. Emi Sakura & Kaori Yoneyama (JWP 8/19/12) ***3/4 17. Arisa Nakajima & Syuri vs. Kana & Kagetsu (Kana Produce 9/11/12) **** 18. Arisa Nakajima & Command Bolshoi vs. Hanako Nakamori & Maury (JWP 10/28/12) ***3/4 19. Arisa Nakajima vs. Emi Sakura - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 12/24/12) ***1/4 JWP Ace - 1st Peak 2013 is when Arisa becomes one of the best wrestlers in the world and imo the best Joshi worker at the time (Io Shirai will push her and beat her for that #1 spot in the years to come, but I don't think she hits that level until 2015). I don't think anyone else at the time was putting so much heat into her feuds and then delivering with high quality matches pretty much every time. Her match with Yumiko Hotta on 4/14/13 is by the best match Hotta had had in many years and she's never come close to that level since. Hotta can't really bump so Arisa has to get her ass kicked and thrown all over the place, and she's able to work a match like this while still coming across as really tough. There's a tremdenous hint of malice and violence in how she wrestles (she'll get the nickname 'Violence Queen') later. The main focus of this period will be her feud with Kana. The match on 8/18/13 should be watched first for context, and it's a great match in its own right. Their match on 12/15/13 is a true classic. If someone said it's the best Joshi match of the 21st Century I'd think that perfectly reasonable. It's chaotic, it's brutal, at times it's unhinged. Everyone who saw that match never forgot it, so much that whenever Arisa and Kana would interact in later tag matches the crowd would get super tense just seeing them square up again. And when they tagged together they'd still act like they hated each other. But around that insane brawl you can also see an excellent babyface vs. babyface matwork match with Command Bolshoi on 7/28/13. Arisa had a lot of 'student vs. mentor' style matches with Bolshoi that never turned into a feud, and this is one of the best. The intergender barbed wire death match Arisa has on a Kana Produce show on 2/25/14 isn't really to my tastes although I still really enjoyed it and others may like it more than me. It's certainly a good look at Arisa outside her usual style. I'm a huge fan of Arisa's performance in the 6/28/15 match against Hiroyo Matsumoto. Unlike a lot of her contempories she actually takes Hiroyo's larger size into account. A moment in the match I really liked is when Arisa does multiple top rope dropkicks, but doesn't wait for Hiroyo to get into position, she just hits her while she's still on the floor. She then follows this up with an awesome slow and struggling-against-adversity German Suplex. Check it out. A match I still included because it is very good, but it is a bit disappointing, is the match against Meiko Satomora on 7/30/15. You'd think these two could have a classic, but unfortunately it's worked like Meiko just beating midcarder when she's in between title matches. While we're on negatives, if there's 1 negative comment I'll make about Arisa, especially around this time (she'll drop it later), is I wish she didn't throw so many rolling German Suplexes. She's hardly the worst offender, but it strikes me as odd that she'll do this for a nearfall (it never wins a match), but then pin people with a single German later on. 20. Arisa Nakajima vs. Kayoko Haruyama - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 2/17/13) ***1/2 21. Arisa Nakajima vs. Yumiko Hotta - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 4/14/13) **** 22. Arisa Nakajima vs. Misaki Ohata - Catch The Wave Tournament Final (WAVE 7/15/13) ***3/4 23. Arisa Nakajima vs. Command Bolshoi (JWP 7/28/13) **** 24. Arisa Nakajima vs. Kana - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 8/18/13) **** 25. Arisa Nakajima & Hanako Nakamori vs. Kana & Meiko Satomura (JWP 11/24/13) **** 26. Arisa Nakajima vs. Kana - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 12/15/13) ****3/4 27. Arisa Nakajima vs. Io Shirai - JWP Openweight Title (Stardom 12/29/13) ***3/4 28. Arisa Nakajima & Jun Kasai vs. Ayako Hamada & Ryuji Ito - Barbed Wire Death Match (Kana Pro 2/25/14) ***1/2 29. Arisa Nakajima vs. Kyoko Kimura - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 4/20/14) **** 30. Arisa Nakajima & Kana & Meiko Satomura vs. Hanako Nakamori & Kayoko Haruyama & Leon (JWP 8/17/14) ***3/4 31. Arisa Nakajima & Rabbit Miu vs. Hikaru Shida & Kaho Kobayashi (Kana Pro 10/7/14) ***3/4 32. Arisa Nakajima vs. Hanako Nakamori - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 10/26/14) ***1/2 33. Arisa Nakajima vs. Tsukasa Fujimoto - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 12/28/14) ****1/4 34. Arisa Nakajima & Kana vs. Hikaru Shida & Syuri (Kana Pro 2/25/15) **** 35. Arisa Nakajima vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto (Hiroyo Matsumoto Produce 6/28/15) ****1/4 36. Arisa Nakajima vs. Hikaru Shida (JWP 7/11/15) ***3/4 37. Arisa Nakajima vs. Meiko Satomura (Sendai Girls 7/30/15) ***1/2 38. Arisa Nakajima, Rina Yamashita & Ryo Mizunami vs. Kana, Hikaru Shida & Syuri (Kana Pro 9/15/15) ***3/4 Enter Best Friends In 2015 Arisa formed a tag team with the Ice Ribbon top star Tsukasa Fujimoto called 'Best Friends'. They'd remain a regular tag team right up to Arisa's retirement, and imo are the best Joshi tag team of the era. It's very impressive that Arisa goes straight from being the best singles worker on the scene to being the best tag wrestler the moment she made that more her focus. Also, in 2016 we had an angle where Arisa joined Mayumi Ozaki's heel faction in Oz Academy. This was a bit odd to me, as she's a babyface everywhere else, but it's an opportunity to see her work in the different environment, even if the environment of '2010s Mayumi Ozaki shenanigans' is not very conduce to good matches. Arisa's match with Sonoko Kato on 1/10/16 is a good showing from her, despite the nonsense and interference trying to drag things down they still do have a good match. This all leads to Arisa and Mayumi Ozaki having a JWP Openweight Title match on 4/3/16, which you can add the Arisa's resume of getting incredibly good matches out of aging veterans who weren't really having quality matches anymore. 39. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. DASH Chisako & Sendai Sachiko - JWP Tag Team Titles (JWP 12/27/15) **** 40. Arisa Nakajima vs. Sonoko Kato (Oz Academy 1/10/16) ***1/4 41. Arisa Nakajima vs. Rabbit Miu (JWP 1/13/16) ***1/2 42. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Kazuki & Rydeen Hagane (JWP 1/17/16) **** 43. Arisa Nakajima vs. Mayumi Ozaki - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 4/3/16) **** 44. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Emi Sakura & Nanae Takahashi (Ice Ribbon 5/4/16) ****1/4 45. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Nanae Takahashi & Yoshiko (JWP 7/24/16) ****1/4 46. Arisa Nakajima vs. Ryo Mizunami (SEAdLINNNG 9/28/16) **** 47. Arisa Nakajima vs. Yoshiko (SEAdLINNNG 10/16/16) ***3/4 48. Arisa Nakajima vs. Command Bolshoi (JWP 12/18/16) ***3/4 49. Arisa Nakajima vs. Hanako Nakamori - JWP Openweight Title (JWP 12/28/16) **** Move to SEAdLINNNG In 2017 switched promotions to SEAdLINNNG. For her fans this was certainly a good move. She'd been JWP champion for most of the last 5 years and had wrestled everyone multiple times. What more was there left to do? As well as getting to see her with a few new opponents, this move also changed her position on the card. Whereas in JWP she was the top star, in SEAdLINNNG the top star was unambiguously Nanae Takahashi. Arisa would have to compete for the #2 spot with Yoshiko, and it's not clear that she'd even win that battle. Some fans were annoyed about this, but I think Arisa switching out of the Ace role to someone who could show a bit more vulnerability and was more of a tag wrestler actually helped freshen her up and she slotted into the role easily. The Best Friends vs. Nanae Takahashi & Sareee match on 5/5/17 is one of the most blowaway unexpected amazing matches from this list. Sareee fans should also check it out to see how early she was showing signs of greatness. It's a worked in the classic Zenjo style where they build to a big expected rythmnic finishing stretch where you're biting on every nearfall and never overstays its welcome. The rematch on 7/14/17 didn't recapture the magic but it's still great. The other highlight of this period is Arisa's feud with Misaki Ohata. It started as Best Friends vs. Avid Rival (the team of Ohata and Ryo Mizunami) feuding, until Nakajima and Ohata just, well, getting really mad at each other turned into something more heated. Arisa is really talented at building actual heated feuds, rather than just a series of matches. On 8/11/18 we have another one of those student-mentor babyface-babyface matwork matches with Command Bolshoi, and this one I think is the best of the lot. Check out Bolshoi's brilliant counter of the double footstomp. I've cut this period off with Arisa's feud with Nanae Takahashi, which culminates in a Hair vs Hair match on 11/2/19. Anyone familiar with Joshi should know that's the biggest stipulation match there is for the scene, and it's a pretty famous modern match. Their title match on 11/1/18 is the true classic imo though. These two are perfect rivals for each other. It wouldn't be fair to throw Takahashi in with those 'aging veterans' I mentioned earlier as she still was a great wrestler at this point, but still her matches with Nakajima are her best series in the 2010s. They both have a delightful love for stiff violence that they bring out of each other. 50. Arisa Nakajima & Nanae Takahashi vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto & Ryo Mizunami (SEAdLINNNG 3/16/17) ***3/4 51. Arisa Nakajima vs. Tsukasa Fujimoto (Ice Ribbon 3/26/17) **** 52. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Nanae Takahashi & Sareee (SEAdLINNNG 5/5/17) ****1/2 53. Arisa Nakajima vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto (SEAdLINNNG 5/24/17) **** 54. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Nanae Takahashi & Sareee (SEAdLINNNG 7/14/17) **** 55. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Misaki Ohata & Ryo Mizunami (SEAdLINNNG 8/24/17) ***1/2 56. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Misaki Ohata & Ryo Mizunami (Ice Ribbon 8/27/17) ***3/4 57. Arisa Nakajima vs. Tsukasa Fujimoto (SEAdLINNNG 12/13/17) ****1/4 58. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto & Misaki Ohata (SEAdLINNNG 2/9/18) ***3/4 59. Arisa Nakajima vs. Misaki Ohata (WAVE 2/12/18) **** 60. Arisa Nakajima vs. Misaki Ohata (WAVE 4/7/18) **** 61. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Command Bolshoi & Yoshiko (SEAdLINNNG 4/18/18) ***1/2 62. Arisa Nakajima vs. Command Bolshoi (PURE-J 8/11/18) ****1/4 63. Arisa Nakajima vs. Rina Yamashita (SEAdLINNNG 10/3/18) ***3/4 64. Arisa Nakajima & Takumi Iroha vs. Hanako Nakamori & Nanae Takahashi (SEAdLINNNG 10/17/18) ***3/4 65. Arisa Nakajima vs. Nanae Takahashi - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title (SEAdLINNNG 11/1/18) ****1/2 66. Arisa Nakajima vs. Nanae Takahashi (SEAdLINNNG 4/28/19) ***3/4 67. Arisa Nakajima vs. Mei Hoshizuki (Marvelous 5/12/19) ***1/2 68. Arisa Nakajima vs. VENY (SEAdLINNNG 5/29/19) ***1/4 69. Arisa Nakajima vs. Takumi Iroha - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title (SEAdLINNNG 9/18/19) **** 70. Arisa Nakajima vs. Nanae Takahashi - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title, Hair vs. Hair (SEAdLINNNG 11/2/19) **** Covid Era and SEAdLINNNG Ace It's unfortunate that Arisa's run as SEAdLINNNG Ace (now Nanae has stepped back somewhat) happened to coincidence with the covid pandemic, so most of it happens in front of no/almost no fans or silent crowds due to the restrictions of the time. She spends most of 2020 in a feud with Yoshiko, who had recently become a Japanese social media celebrity from her side hustle as a TikTok chef (not making that up this actually happened). Their 1/24/20 match happens right before the pandemic restrictions so kinda wins MOTY by default due to it having a loud crowd. Yoshiko can be a bit hit or miss because she's a big unsophisicated brute of a wrestler and you kinda have to work her style or the match won't be good but Arisa is one of the best at going along with that kind of match. By the time the covid restrictions are lifted around early 2022, I think Arisa had lost a step or two. She's still a great wrestler, but she's not one of the best wrestlers in the world like she was for most of 2013-19 (I think covid era too hard to judge). SEAdLINNNG as a promotion was pretty badly hit by the pandemic ruining business plans and them losing wrestlers, so in 2022-23 it's pretty much the Arisa Nakajima show. These aren't the years when she was the best as a wrestler, but she still has a lot of great matches due to the constant opportunities she was getting. Two impressive performances here are her title defences against Riko Kaiju and Ayame Sasamura on 5/13/22 and 3/20/23, where she guides two younger wrestlers to the best singles matches of their careers to date. Her title defense on 8/25/23 against Sareee ended up being her last great singles match, and might actually be her most famous match in Western fandom due to Sareee getting a bit of a following at the time after her recent departure from WWE. 71. Arisa Nakajima vs. Yoshiko (SEAdLINNNG 1/24/20) ****1/2 72. Arisa Nakajima vs. VENY - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title (SEAdLINNNG 6/13/20) ***3/4 73. Arisa Nakajima vs. Yoshiko - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title (SEAdLINNNG 7/13/20) **** 74. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto & Yoshiko (SEAdLINNNG 10/3/20) **** 75. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Saori Anou & Tsukushi (Ice Ribbon 10/31/20) **** 76. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Sareee & Yoshiko - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Tag Team Titles (SEAdLINNNG 11/27/20) **** 77. Arisa Nakajima & Nanae Takakashi vs. Honori Hana & Riko Kawahata (SEAdLINNNG 4/26/21) ***1/2 78. Arisa Nakajima & Nanae Takahashi vs. Makoto & VENY - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Tag Team Titles (SEAdLINNNG 5/26/21) **** 79. Arisa Nakajima vs. Nanae Takahashi (SEAdLINNNG 7/11/21) **** 80. Arisa Nakajima vs. Hanako Nakamori (SEAdLINNNG 10/13/21) **** 81. Arisa Nakajima & Hanako Nakamori vs. Cherry & Leon (PURE-J 11/11/21) **** 82. Arisa Nakajima & Riko Kaiju vs. AKARI & Hanako Nakamori (PURE-J 11/23/21) **** 83. Arisa Nakajima & Kaoru Ito vs. Ayako Sato & Hanako Nakamori (PURE-J 2/6/22) ***3/4 84. Arisa Nakajima & Hanako Nakamori vs. Miyuki Takase & Rina Yamashita (PURE-J 3/20/22) **** 85. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Ai Houzan & Yurika Oka (Korakuen Hall 60th Anniversary Show 4/15/22) ***1/2 86. Arisa Nakajima vs. Tsukasa Fujimoto (SEAdLINNNG 4/29/22) ***3/4 87. Arisa Nakajima vs. Riko Kaiju - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title (SEAdLINNNG 5/13/22) ***3/4 88. Arisa Nakajima vs. Hiroyo Matsumoto - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title (SEAdLINNNG 12/28/22) **** 89. Arisa Nakajima vs. Mio Momono (Marvelous 2/21/23) ***1/2 90. Arisa Nakajima vs. Ayame Sasamura - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title (SEAdLINNNG 3/20/23) ****1/4 91. Arisa Nakajima & Takumi Iroha vs. Ayame Sasamura & Riko Kaiju (SEAdLINNNG 4/30/23) ***1/2 92. Arisa Nakajima & Itsuki Aoki vs. Riko Kawahata & Sareee (SEAdLINNNG 7/26/23) ***1/2 93. Arisa Nakajima & Takumi Iroha vs. Kairi Hojo & Sareee (Sareee-ISM 8/4/23) ***3/4 94. Arisa Nakajima vs. Sareee - SEAdLINNNG Beyond The Sea Title (SEAdLINNNG 8/25/23) ****1/4 Retirement Run On 1/11/24 Arisa suffered a bizarre neck injury in a SEAdLINNNG tag match. It wasn't clear what had happened initially, she just collapsed on the apron during the match seemingly unable to move and couldn't continue. What happened is about a minute before she'd gone for a top rope double footstomp, hit the mat on her feet, but her momentum carried her through and she banged the top of her head on the mat. It happens so quickly you could skip a frame and not even see it but it was enough to hurt her bad, bad enough that apparently she was advised by doctors to retire. But she came back for one last retirement run and a bunch more quality matches to sink our teeth into. The match on 6/12/24 is hard to explain. It's actually a tag match that turns into a trios match that turns into a 6vs6 tag, but I'm counting it as 1 match as it's presented as one complete package and is really a load of Arisa's fellow 2006 debutees and a few friends having one last big match together. The kind of match that tugs at the heart strings if you've been following the scene for a while. Her retirement match on 8/23/24 probably couldn't have gone any better really. Best Friends tag together one last time against two of Arisa's most frequent opponents. The finishing stretch is really long and is mostly Arisa doing big kickouts, but it works because every time she kicks out it means her career gets to go on just a little bit longer and I wanted her to just keep kicking out so she never has to retire. But we know how it ends 95. Arisa Nakajima & Sareee vs. Hanako Nakamori & Kaoru Ito (Ito Dojo 5/12/24) ***1/2 96. Arisa Nakajima, Makoto, Maya Yukihi, Mima Shimoda, Nagisa Nozaki & VENY vs. Ayame Sasamura, DASH Chisako, Rina Yamashita, Syuri, Tsukasa Fujimoto & Yuki Mashiro (SEAdLINNNG 6/12/24) ***3/4 97. Arisa Nakajima & Leon vs. KAZUKI & Rydeen Hagane (PURE-J 7/5/24) ****1/4 98. Arisa Nakajima & Hiroyo Matsumoto vs. Ayame Sasamura & Itsuki Aoki (SEAdLINNNG 7/26/24) ***3/4 99. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Mio Momono & Riko Kawahata (Sareee-ISM 7/29/24) **** 100. Arisa Nakajima & Tsukasa Fujimoto vs. Hanako Nakamori & Hiroyo Matsumoto - Arisa Nakajima Retirement Match (SEAdLINNNG 8/23/24) ****1/4 The further into her career you go I'd say Arisa Nakajima stands out more and more because of what she represented. She worked almost her entire career as a babyface and top star, but she's almost a brutal and ruthless menace. She got people to cheer for her out of awe at the levels of violence and rage she put into her wrestling. Whereas Joshi mostly evolved into these big epics based around fancy moves and counters (e.g. Stardom), Arisa's appeal was more about seeing her angrily and ungracefully beat the snot out of her opponent until they couldn't resist any more. Not all her matches were like that of course (the Bolshoi series for example is a lot more... civilised), but it's her forte, and the more she stuck to the style of wrestling she believed in the more I respected her and what she stood for. Yes she will be high on my list.