[1992-11-26-AJW-Dream Rush] Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Mayumi Ozaki & Dynamite Kansai

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[FLIK]

- (3WA Tag Title Match, 2/3 Falls) Toshiyo Yamada & Manami Toyota © vs Dynamite Kansai & Mayumi Ozaki

Another match whear I don't really need to give too many details on the action. It's so famous that I assume a large amount of the people out thear reading this have seen it and those that haven't, nothing I write can properly caputre this match anyways. A few random thoughts and observations though. The backstory of this match is interesting. The 9/19 FMW match had the dynamic of Kudo & Combat being former AJW girls who were deemed not good enough and let go years earlier, this match has the dynamic of Kansai & OZ being 2 girls who weren't good enough to get into AJW to begin with as the story goes that they had gone to their open tryouts but never made the cut so ended up having to go to JWP instead. Also interesting to point out that OZ & Kansai were pretty much just randomly thrown together to represent the company. Kind of this myth that some people have but they were never a regular team or ever even very close allies. They had the 3 Toyota/Yamada matches, the 2 Takako/Hotta matches, Thunderqueen, a few other random multi man tags and that's it really. I'm sure there may have been more on house shows perhaps but if you've seen the handfull of matches I just listed thear then you've seen pretty much their entire run as a team. Almost the entire rest of their careers they spent feuding against each other on and off. Like Aja/Bull there were a lot of cool little moments and touches I caught this time around i'd either forgotten about or never knew about before. The high level of energy & pacing througout this match really impressed me a lot on this viewing as well. Like for the entire 40+ mins there's ALWAYS something going on, like even when someone it put in a hold there's constant moving, with the opponent trying to fight out of it or the partner trying to save. Just non stop action but never done in a way that's over whelming or that loses you from being too hard to keep up with. With a few exceptions, no team ever controlls things for more then a few minutes either but it's in no way a spotfest and there's a definate plot/build to things. In the 1st fall I got a big kick out of Kansai & OZ doing the flying head butt since that's one of Toyota & Yamada's big signature double teams. Toyota getting pined by Kansai to end it continued the subtle story they'd been telling of her being the weak link in the team. Not counting the mini Mexico tour, Her & Yamada hadn't won a televised AJW match in months leading up to this and each time they lost it was Toyota eating the pin. Yamada firing up and blitzing Kansai with a billion backdrop drivers and then the Gori Special Bomb to save the day and quickly tie things up in a short 2nd fall was awesome. At this point they're allready 17+ mins in and if they'd just left it thear it would be considered a great match but the 3rd fall is the best of all and is what really puts this match over the top. The JWP girls throughout the match make the most effort to maybe slow things down a little bit and here's whear they make their strongest attempt trying to wear down Yamada by attacking her arm and then Toyota for a little bit. OZ kind of steals the show at this point. Like Kansai was the bulldozing wrecking machine in this match, just fuckin shit up left and right, muggin folks for their lunch money. Yamada brought a ton of passion and fire and fighting spirit, maybe more so then in any match she's ever had. Toyota did her thing too, not to undersell her because she was great but she didn't stand out as much as the other 3. OZ though, yeah, she brought not only the work but the personality. She turns up the bitch facotor to 10 and then cranks it up to 13 just because. So so awesome just standing on the apron and doing little things, slaping away Toyota's as she reaches for the rope, stomping on her hands, getting in cheap shots. Great moment later in the match whear Kansai has Toyota in a figure 4 and OZ just comes in and puts her in a cross arm breaker at the same time. As time goes on you can tell the JWP team is getting a little more frustrated with things, after a relatively clean match they start resorting to brawling on the floor, chairs, other stuff like that too. Other major highlight of this is the Kansai/Yamada exchanges, like even before the match happened, at the press conference & contract signing they have those 2 get into an altercation and it's clear that's the pairing you're supposed to be most excited about seeing going in and coming out of this match. And holy hell do they deliver, some of the most heated exchanges of the match come between them here, especially the 2 kick exchanges. Kansai wins the 1st easily but Yamada fires up and gains her revenge not long after in just a brutal slugfest. Last observation is again, just how mind blowing it was that they kept up the pace for so long and still had as much energy 40 mins in as they did 5 and also, after that long of a match it dawned on me that they hadn't even done half of the shit they were capable of and were clearly holding back. Toyota & Yamada didn't get in a lot of their usual double team spots. At no point does Toyota even go for a JOCS or a lot of her other suplexes and stuff for example. Ending finally comes when Toyota redeems herself by busting out the straight jacket german on OZ however. OZ kicked out just before 3 but it was counted anyways, but fuck it, that's why god made re-matches which they had to have known they were gonna be doing. Yamada gets on the mic and gloats as the crowd erupts in a huge Zenjo chant. Greatest joshi tag of all time? Unquestionably, no. Up thear as a contender, absolutely.

[MJH]

1992 MOTY and the best match ever at this point.

 

Very little to say, only that Kansai's performance here has really grown on me over the years, to the point where, the last time I watched it, I thought she was the best out there.

[FLIK]

Yeah, def would rank Kansai as the best one in the match. Followed by Yamada, OZ & Toyota in that order. Funny since the style they worked was essentially Toyota's specialty more then anyone else.

 

Felt torn on whether to call this the best ever or not.

 

Jungle Jack vs Bull & Grizzly 8/90

Jungle Jack vs Toyota & Moreno 4/91

Jungle Jack vs Bull & Kyoko 6/91

 

Not saying the above 3 are better but Dream Rush isn't so far ahead that I wouldn't atleast consider those others as being on or close to the same level.

[NintendoLogic]

I'm pretty sure Mayumi Ozaki is my favorite tag wrestler. I've dug just about everything I've seen with her and Dynamite Kansai or Cutie Suzuki. I love the way she does little things like taking cheap shots, breaking up pins, running interference, and knocking away the hand of someone trying to make the ropes. And she's awesome at providing structure and reeling things in. For example, when Toyata gets heel heat on her own team for attacking Kansai while she had Yamada in the Sharpshooter, Ozaki runs in for the cheap shot on Yamada to put the heat back on her team.

 

Speaking of Toyota, I was pretty hard on her in the hair match thread. But I generally enjoy her in tag matches, which tend to accentuate her strengths and hide her weaknesses. Her short-term selling and inhuman flexibility make her a great FIP, and her sprinty style makes her great off the hot tag. Plus, her general disregard of long-term selling isn't as big a deal in matches where you can tag out and recuperate. With regard to this match in particular, she does an outstanding job of looking like she's at death's door after eating the first pinfall.

 

I have a few issues with the match. First, far too much of the matwork is of the "I've got a hold locked in, but now I'm going to release it for no reason" variety (which appears to be a staple of early 90s joshi, unfortunately). And the second fall is fine in conception, but it fell flat in practice. Yamada was clearly gassed after the third backdrop, but she kept going and was barely getting any elevation at all at the end. But those are fairly minor quibbles. All things considered, this match is awesome.

[Loss]

And there it is, the best match of all time from where I sit. Kansai and Ozaki give an outstanding heel performance. Ozaki's facial expressions of getting joy out of the suffering of Toyota and Yamada are awesome, and the moment where she steps on Toyota's hand to prevent her from reaching the ropes when Kansai has her in a figure four is classic. The positioning here is also interesting, in that Yamada was pushed as the stronger member of her team, getting the fall over Kansai. Toyota gets the pinfall over Oz at the end, but goes through a lot to get that point, and is put in a position to sell far more than Yamada. I've seen this match quite a few times, and it's possible that Kansai's performance could grow on me over time, but Ozaki stands out more than anyone for me. I love how in tune she is with what the crowd wants to see. When they start chanting for Toyota, she takes the aggression and asshole behavior to a new level every time. The smug demeanor and general disgust with her opponents is awesome. Yamada and Dynamite are always great together, and they're my favorite pairing in this match. Just pitch-perfect all around.

[FLIK]

Toyota gets the pinfall over Oz at the end, but goes through a lot to get that point,

Yeah, that was def meant as her big redemption moment after everything that had happened the past few months.

[Tim Evans]

I can't see how this is the best match of all time but it is really really good. I've been down on Kansai on these yearbooks but she brought her A game here. That clothesline she gave Toyota at the end of the first fall is just brutal. Also the crowd was awesome.

[Zenjo]

It's my MOTY. It's lots of peoples MOTY. I don't need to tell everyone how great this is.

 

What I noticed on this viewing was how they integrated parts of the old JWP style into the match. It was structured with moves segments alternating with hold segments. This provided the perfect counterbalance to the AJW teams Go Go Go style, which would never have worked over a 42m match.

[Kevin Ridge]

Best match of all time? Best match up until this point? Pretty high praise here. I'll admit at not being the biggest Joshi fan but this was pretty darn great. If I did a rankings for 1992 would be interesting to myself where this one ends up because it definitely is near the top. My issues with Joshi tend to be I'm not personally invested in anyone but I can get behind someone like Ozaki. She was fantastic is this match with her heelish antics. Toyota doing the rolling cradle so late in the match was silly and almost hurt things for me but in the end I am able to overlook it due to the whole body of the match.

[slabinski611]

When I hear people throw out words like GOAT, do they mean for joshi ? best overall up to this point ? or simply GOAT ? I am new to joshi so I don't know the backstory which I'm sure hurts it for me. However, I will put this tag up against just about any other tag match I've seen not including the big 4 from AJPW. Since 6/9/95 is either my favorite or 1a,1b of all time I must ask, do people really like this one more than 6/9/95 ? I consider that to be the perfect tag match though it is not meant to be a knock on this match, which I loved.

[PeteF3]

I didn't know much of the backstory either--just that Toyota and Yamada are tag partners who had been feuding with each other at the same time previous, and that this is an interpromotional match. And that it's a total, fucking, war. And that the "best match ever" praise is not unfounded in the least.

 

I mean, Liger/Samurai instantly became one of my favorite matches ever and I have to say this match definitively left it in the dust. I praised the first two matches because of their "non-joshiness," but this is the absolute peak of what I think most consider the joshi style, or at least the '90s style. It's all action with super high-end offense, but it's done with an intensity and a hatred and a sense of both teams fighting for everything, for their promotions as well as themselves, to a standard that almost no other bout has ever been able to match. I've also criticized some joshi tags because everyone tends to bleed together from a style and strength-and-weakness standpoint. Well, that's not in effect here. Toyota and Yamada are already great contrasts, which is why they're as good as rivals as they are as partners--and Kansai and Ozaki are a fine contrast as well. Kansai can match Yamada kick for kick and Ozaki is such a delightful bitch, making a nuisance of herself on the apron. There's also a terrific moment where Kansai has Toyota in a figure four and Oz comes in and applies a cross armbreaker, and she takes time to turn and wink to the camera, just because she can. The first fall alone is one of the greatest wars you'll ever see in wrestling, and the second fall is booked perfectly with the champs and Yamada in particular stepping up with their backs to the wall and quickly equalizing. Escalating back-and-forth third fall with Kansai and Yamada just murdering each other with kicks, Toyota providing the great highspots but also playing a terrific sympathetic babyface, and a just-ambiguous-enough ending because it's still an interpromotional match and God knows that's a prerequisite.

 

So there's your 1992 Match of the Year, and there quite possibly is your Match of the Decade. This is pretty much perfection from an action, drama, and booking standpoint, and this is coming from a joshi skeptic.

[Zenjo]

Your conversion from Joshi hater into Joshi sceptic into mild Joshi fan into eventual crazed Joshi fanatic seems to be well on track Pete.

[PeteF3]

Hey now--Kong vs. Hotta where Kong tears up Hotta's hand was the second puro match I ever saw, way back in 1995, and I thought it was awesome. I was never a "hater."

[WingedEagle]

Yeah this is a great, great match. One of the best of the year. Definitely one of Oz's best performances, as while Yamada stood out on her side, this was definitely the Oz show. Responsible for so many little things throughout the match as others before me touched on. What I loved and noticed here:

 

Barely a few minutes in you can see why Toyota often fares better in tags, especially against these opponents as they keep her focused, slow things down and there's ample time and opportunity for effective selling. Kansai applies a dragon sleeper and Oz comes in to make it a double teamer in just one moment where she amps up the heel schtick. Contrast that to the 1/93 tag in JWP rings where she's the fiery babyface. What an incredible worker. Yamada's hot tags and trading kicks with the bigger Kansai are phenomenal. Kansai & Oz hitting flying headbutts for a spectacular near fall that felt like the finish, as did Kansai's inside out lariat on Toyota. For my money, AJW do the quick fall better than lucha. I liked the first fall at better at Dream Slam II and second fall here a ton for the purpose they serve.

 

Love the JWP team resorting to brawling and chairs in the third as they get frustrated with how things are going and look to literally tear the Toyota & Yamada apart limb by limb. The home team work a quicker pace with tags and big moves down the stretch, including their double headbutts for a near fall as well as some high spots in and out of the ring before the finish.

 

Just an incredible match that never felt like a sprint but also never got bogged down in restholds. The finish was a little shoddy with Oz appearing to kick out before the count. Its absolutely a MOTYC, but falls a hair below Bull/Aja because the stakes and story there were so much greater and pushed it over the top. This didn't have that significance and was "just" an excellent workrate match and the beginning of a story rather than an epic culmination. This was one hell of a night.

 

****1/2

[Loss]

I don't want to say too much about this one because it will spoil what I'm going to write about it in the e-book, but a rewatch only raised my opinion of this even more. Toyota fighting to prove her worth all through the match while Yamada is the repeated savior, the ongoing Yamada-Kansai footwork battle, Ozaki's heat-seeking tactics throughout the match and Toyota's moment of redemption at the end all add up to make this quite the ride. Pretty amazing stuff.

[...TG]

Best match of all time? Not quite, but certainly MOTY. Amazing crowd, great heel work, and Toyota's stuff didn't annoy me all that much.

[Timbo Slice]

I rewatched this earlier this year because someone brought up joshi tag wrestling for the GWE project and both teams had to be considered simply because of this series.

 

On first watch, it was one of the greatest tag matches I've ever seen from strictly a work standpoint. The biggest point that's always brought up is how it's the first time either of these two teams met in the ring and how this, and not the Aja/Bull match ended the show because it was the first interpromotional match between AJW and JWP. So right away, the aura of the match is a big deal and everyone's wondering how the two teams will match up.

 

Once things get going, you realize right away that JWP is on a similar level to AJW, which is a major plot point for the match and sticking point with me (like other interpromotional feuds that actually worked, letting the "invading" team look good makes the feuds better). Kansai is immediately the biggest and best part of the match for me. The way she throws her weight around in the match and rag dolls Toyota is some of her finest work, and while I have come to loathe Toyota as a singles wrestler, her work as a face in peril and her selling overall is top notch here.

 

The second fall with Yamada just going in on Kansai was my favorite part of storytelling in the match, even more than Ozaki's antics, which were spectacular. Her getting the pin on Kansai is an absolutely huge moment in the match because of how Kansai had looked so far, evening things out for the third fall to come, which was just an all-out war. It reminded me a lot of the 5/21/94 HDA vs. Kobashi/Misawa match because of how they built this really long stretch of near falls, and even the decisive pin being a bit inconclusive added to the allure of the interpromotional setting. I know there are some that rate the DreamSlam II match higher because of the the structure (I actually have it behind the St. Final tag, which was a tremendous sprint and showed just how Toyota had owned the style at the time considering where she'd go from there), but there was truly magic behind this match that is hard to quantify. I'm with Pete in my love for the Queendom tag, but I constantly go back and forth between the two for my favorite joshi tag of all time. If you're a Toyota fan, this is an easy pick over Hokuto, but I'm such a huge Hokuto/Aja/Kandori mark that it's hard for me to put that match behind this. All in all, a spectacular match and an easy Top 10 tag match ever, maybe even Top 5.

[Microstatistics]

As of right now I think this is the best joshi match ever. Everything great about pro wrestling encapsulated in about 40 minutes. The non-decisive finish also sets up the rematch perfectly. I completely understand if anyone has this as their GOAT match. *****

[garretta]

I don't get the type of praise that I'm reading for this. Greatest tag match ever? Not even close, not with all the great Southern tags that have taken place over the years.

 

I guess I'm getting tired of the joshi style, because the crazy spotfest you all didn't see is exactly what I saw. If anyone in this match sold anything for more than ten seconds, I'd like to know when. I'm tired of accepting Toyota being figure-foured and looking like her leg's being broken one second and doing moonsaults to the floor the next with perfect spring in her legs and no sign of pain whatsoever the next. That's not a house style, that's just terrible professional wrestling. You want a great tag match? Anything involving the Rock 'n' Roll Express blows this stuff into a million pieces based on Ricky Morton's selling alone. These ladies looked like they barely broke a sweat; considering the moves they were doing, they should have all been stretched out on the mat, semiconscious.

 

I can appreciate a back-and-forth match, but what drama is there in every move by one team being immediately countered by the other for forty-five minutes? Where's the struggle? Where's the emotional investment? Even when one member of a team goes on the attack with chairs, it's immediately countered by chair shots from the other team. Neither side ever seems like they're paying any physical price. No exhaustion, little pain except when they're actually in submission holds ......it's just a moves exhibition. It's pretty at times, but there's nothing substantive to it, nothing to hit me where I live.

 

Sorry, but this one got boring toward the end, and wasn't too hot for me in the beginning and middle either. Maybe I'm too easily influenced by Rock 'n' Roll/Bodies and Blonds/Steamer-Douglas, but that's my standard for great tags around this time frame, and this one falls way short. Maybe the thrill of seeing women who know how to actually wrestle is wearing off too, because I've had all the joshi I can take for right now.

[jdw]

I can appreciate a back-and-forth match, but what drama is there in every move by one team being immediately countered by the other for forty-five minutes?

 

I think you watched a different match. This isn't 45 straight minutes of spot-fu and counters. The first 10:30 alone had a pair of three minute FIP sequences on Toyota, along with a two minute HIP sequence on Kansai. That's 8 of the first 10:30. It's not like it's the last time their have non-back-and-forth segments where one of the wrestlers is getting worked over rather than just a bunch of My Turn, Your Turn shit.

[JKWebb]

#3 - placetobenation.com/countdown-top-500-matches-of-the-90s-50-1/2/

 

This was too go-go for me. I don't understand why someone would attempt so many dropkicks and missile dropkicks when they don't matter. I didn't see any fatigue, and the match still felt like a sprint by the very end. The moves on the outside had no affect. When they were suplexed on the outside, they were back to the ring within seconds. I didn't see any selling. I saw moments of drama where facial expressions were great, but moments later a DDT would not be sold, or suplexes would not be sold. It just seemed like they took so much punishment to be going that fast by the end. Moonsaults had no affect. I just felt like it was a bunch of stiff moves crammed into roughly 45 minutes as quickly as possible. I know a lot folks love this match, and I think I can see why. So, I'm not meaning this as a shot. I knew that I would post that this wouldn't be this high on a list like this for me, so I just wanted to explain myself. If you love this match, then great. It's just not for me. After I wrote this, I started to look at the other reviews. So, I guess you can count me on the same page as garretta. He may have summed up better what I was trying to say. I agree with you 100% garretta.

[garretta]

Thanks, JK. I've enjoyed your reviews a lot, too!

[SmartMark15]

I'm not the biggest joshi fan so I approached this with a little hesitation. However, I did enjoy the moments when the match would slow down. Toyota makes for a pretty decent face in peril and Yamada does as well. Long term selling is not a thing in this match and when I decided to accept that and just give in to the positives (of which there are many), then things just absolutely clicked for me. So many things about this match to love. Kansai as a brutal ass kicker is amazing. Yamada taking Kansai to Suplex City to even things up in the second fall was great. I loved how the suplexes started looking worse and worse as Kansai progressively turned into deadweight. The third fall had a whole string of totally believable false finishes that really surprised me. Toyota and Ozaki made for great ragdolls and bump like ridiculous.

 

And of course, my favorite part of the match: Ozaki's heel tactics. I marked out for EVERY SINGLE moment that she did her best to fuck with one of the faces' rope breaks. Just...AH YES. So much love for those spots. It made me remember Sasha Banks kicking at Bayley's bad hand during Takeover: Brooklyn. But Ozaki just takes it to a whole other level. That simple tactic pretty much took this match up to another level for me, I'm not even kidding.

 

****3/4

[Jetlag]

This' a good match. Watching this again after so many years and having watched quite a bit of joshi from this time period, I understand what's going here isn't exactly mindblowing. The three things special things going on here are as follows:

 

- the length

- the interpromotional flair

- Yamada and Kansai upping the stiffness x10000 and kicking the life out of everything that got in their way

 

And even the last thing isn't that unusual, as Kansai always worked like that. Other than that, they constantly go by the same go hard->rest pattern and occasionally throw in a sequence to mix it up. Lots of shit that is sloppy or blown and not a ton of selling, but they keep it going which is what counts. People have praised Ozaki's heel work, and it is good, but knowing her a little better now, she probably wasn't thinking too much about it herself. It was pretty much just another night for her.