Assorted Joshi

 Some guy is uploading a bulk of old joshi to YouTube again, so that's a good chance to check out some forgotten gems.

Cutie Suzuki vs Chikako Shiratori, JWP 10/11/1998

Total out of nowhere bloodbath. Right away Shiratori blasts Suzuk with a big backfist and it's a hate filled brawl. I've never really noticed Shiratori as a worker, and I've never seen anyone talk about her aside from her looks, but she looked really impressive controlling the action here. When Suzuki resisted the hair toss, Shiratori make sure to shove her knee into her throat and then drive her face right into the mat. Pretty violent. The match also had plenty of face stomps, biting, hard slaps, and the right sense of escalating violence with chairs and a kendo stick being brought in. You don't expect these two to wrestle like Pirata Morgan vs Faraon but they totally rock it. Even something like a missile dropkick from Shiratori landed flush in Suzukis face. Kendo stick shots looked really grizzly and I dug how Shiratori would seemingly summon that thing out of nowhere. By the end Shiratori was bleeding too and getting dumped by Suzukis crazy suplexes, including one with the kendo stick behind her head, pretty insane. Both were on their way to retirement (Shiratori would quit joshi orgs and instead work Osaka Pro for a year) and this kinda had the feeling that they both didn't care about keeping their faces unscarred and decided to do something really grizzly.

Yumiko Hotta & Kumiko Maekawa vs Michiko Nagashima & Sayuri Okino, AJW 1/3/1998

Absolutely insane wild match. Eagle Sawai is with the LLPW girls in her awesome track pants and shirt, and right away she goes wild brawling before getting on the mic, apparently talking some trash to Shinobu Kandori who is sitting at ringside (looking amazing with her bleach blonde hair and suit). Kandori who has her arm in a sling gets attacked too, then Hotta jumps into the fray, chairs are thrown and this is crazy. Back in the ring the first thing Okino does is bite Hotta in the face, and sure you know the first chance Hotta gets she tries to kick peoples faces in. Okino and Nagashima are really good here brawling and doing chain punches. They handcuff Maekawa and Maekawa ends up taking a big beating, taking bumps with her hands cuffed on that ultra stiff AJW ring while Eagle and Hotta are brawling on the floor again. Hottas tag in and everything that came after building to her finally getting that big run of offense was pretty amazing. Hotta kicking the kendo stick is up there with the wildest kendo stick spots I've seen ever. The heat was super too with the crowd for some reason booing everything Hotta did, I guess LLPW fans must have done an invasion or something. Totally chaotic, violent and unpredictable fight, these kinda brawls are probably the most underrated part of mid-late 90s joshi.

Tomoko Miyaguchi & Kanako Motoya vs Tomoko Kuzumi & Dynamite Kansai, JWP 11/15/1998

I have to say, while some people say Kansai was largely done after 1997, I find she adds a lot to every match she's in simply by bringing a ton of violence and being a big menace. Not as hard as in 1993 but this is still a veritable great match largely thanks to Kansais presence. The match is fast action stuff when Hyuga is in, and focussed on young Miyaguchi & Motoya trying to take down Kansai when she's in. It leads to this really great sequence where they finally get her prone on the mat and start rushing her with all they've got, with Miyaguchi cracking Kansais jaw with probably the greatest elbow smash I've ever seen in a match. Hyugas all action stuff was good, Kansai as a hard to take down dangerous giant story was good, last couple minutes were pretty damn great with big bombs, Kansai kicking everyone in the face etc. Well worth checking out.

More Twitcasting Era Sportiva

 Kazuhiro Tamura & Yusaku Ito vs 801 Kenichi & Michio Kageyama, Sportiva 6/12/2019

WOW! Absolute workhorse performance from Tamura. See I really like Sportiva matches where the guys have their working boots on. They really nail that studio TV match feel stylized to japanese wrestling where they have nifty match with few moves and working more neat touches into their exchanges. Everybody had their working boots on here, but Tamura was off the charts. He busts out a nice mat section with Kageyama. Then he gets some decent exchanges out of 801 Kenichi. Finally he does some really nice work working a body part by kicking the crap out of Kenichis shoulder and arm in painful ways. And after all that, he gets a finishing stretch out of Kenichi where Kenichi actually gets to add cool touches as they work some choice counters with Kenichi trying to turn Tamuras arm attacks into throws and slams. Considering how dull Kenichi usually is that is truly a monumental carryjob. And it wasn’t just ‘ok’ it was legit good! Kenichi turning Tamuras flying armbar attempt into a firemans carry was legit great and so were Tamuras counters to the chokebomb attempt. They actually built to Kenichis stuff as Tamura kept cutting off his comeback attempts down the stretch until Kenichi was finally able to hit it. So even a basic gutwrench suplex or lariat felt huge. Excellent stuff from Tamura. Everybody else was good do – I particularily liked Kageyamas hot tag that featured a great looking DDT and a reckless dragon screw – but Tamura owned the match. Fine fine piece of workmanship.

Hiroaki Ura & Toru Sugiura vs 801 Kenichi & Michio Kageyama, Sportiva 6/19/2019

Another very good Sportiva tag, that little sportsbar was cooking June 2019. Right at the go we get a great exchange between Sugiura and Kenichi that veered into shooty territory. Kenichi actually looks good for a change as he sweeps Sugiura off his feet to deliver some hefty looking hands before Sugiura gets back it him trying to kick his head off. Fuck, was Kenichi actually getting good that month?! He was still limited in what he actually could do, but actually energetic in what he did. Sugiura also had his working boots on which is always fun. Then Ura gets reminded that he’s still a young boy as he can’t get Kageyama up for a bodyslam then gets a beatdown. The subsequent middle proportion is good as all these guys really have their stuff down pat. Then we get a very good finish as Ura struggles hard to overcome Kenichi. Kenichi works in that role as a big block for Ura to overcome and Uras struggle is worth while. I loved how Ura get a desperation leglock on Kenichi and started beating away at his leg with fists in frustration when Kenichi made the ropes. Kenichi also dumps him with nasty suplexes that actually look good. Nice stuff and actually got me kinda excited for their singles match the following week.

Hiroaki Ura vs 801 Kenichi, Sportiva 6/26/2019

The follow up match to last weeks battle! Can 801 Kenichi keep it up and finally deliver? Well.. not really. He’s still rather limited. But, he headbutts Ura really hard during the opening exchanges and then serves as a massive block for Ura to overcome, and that is fine enough. Ura is great here, tons of fire, coming at Kenichi hard, trying to take out his leg… initially Kenichi blows off the leg attack but later his leg gives out anyway so that was pretty cool. Exciting match because I am into following Uras trajectory. He is getting to that point where he is now starting to incooperate new things, surviving more punishment than before but also getting dropped harder by Kenichis germans. It’s a cool journey to follow and it’s got me hooked.