This was a very exciting match, but it was more notable for the fact that the crowd was actually really into it. The problem was the match contained more than its share of blown spots, mainly from Sugar. Also, Chikayo got her feet stuck in the ropes on a tope at one point. She did have the two highlights of the match though, German suplexing Aja (impressive because Aja appears to weigh more than twice as much as Chikayo) and giving her a footstomp off the top to the floor. Ozaki was really good with the exception of blowing one powerbomb spot with Chikayo. Aja & Ozaki took the titles when Ozaki pinned Sugar in her tequila sunrise. Their 7/18/99 match where Sato & Nagashima regain the titles is better due to a better story and the execution being what it should be.

Chris: Once again, Aja showed what a true pro she is. She could easily have no sold and squashed Sugar & Chikayo. At their size, it would have been perfectly reasonable if she did. Instead, Aja used this match to totally put the younger girls over, even in their loss.

Michael: For once, I can praise a crowd for adding to a match instead of sleeping through it. Aja selling some of Sugar's weak urakens didn't help things, but the blown spots didn't really hurt the match for me. In fact, Ozaki's powerbomb still looked credible since Chikayo landed well on it. The Ligerbomb towards the end that Oz pulled Sugar out of to set up the tequila sunrise bothered me more because it wasn't like Sugar kicked out of the Ligerbomb only to succumb to Ozaki's true finisher. It was more like Oz pulled Sugar up to dole out more punishment, so Sugar didn't gain anything from it.

12:02

Rating:

AAAW Single Senshuken Jiai: Chigusa Nagayo vs. Devil Masami Taped 8/23 Tokyo Korakuen Hall

In the past, these two have had very good matches, but they are just too big and unathletic to have a quality match together at this point. This was just an awful match with no redeeming factors. It was slow-paced and very deliberate with a ton of no selling. Chigusa even no sold a nadare shiki no Northern Lights suplex. The comebacks sucked because they all seemed to be off no sell spots. Devil wrestled like Super Heel even though she wasn't billed as such. Easily the worst match these two have ever had together. Chigusa scored a submission victory with a doushime sleeper.

Chris: I was looking forward to a match that would be much better than the horrid Zero/Superheel match from 9/20/97. They might as well have gone with those gimmicks because they worked the same way. It would not have made for a better match, but at least it would have made a little more sense because no selling is part of the Zero & Super Heel gimmicks.

Michael: It was like they were too lazy to sell so it was predictable rather than exciting. The match was even worse the second time I watched it because the first time I held out a little hope that it would get better, whereas the second time I knew it would be bad throughout.

14:17

These two usually have very good matches, but this wasn't one of them. As feared, the result of all these short spotfests is that these two didn't have the stamina to go this long or the experience in putting over the toll of the match. This actually got off to a hot start and was a good match for the first 25 minutes, but they just hit the wall at that point. The last 5 minutes were very weak with sloppily executed or blown spots because they both blew up. Satomura's acting needed to be better as she seemed to remember to have to remember to sell, which meant it wound up looking pretty fake due to a slightly delayed reaction. The purpose of this match was to show that they were even, and that was accomplished, but this wasn't exactly conjuring up memories of the draws Toyota & Yamada had in 1991-92.

Michael: A lot of the stamina problem stems from the fact that they normally wrestle in matches that are, at most, half as long as this. The rest of it is that they don't know how to pace a match regardless of the length. Chigusa being out there probably put more pressure on them as well, so they may have been trying too hard and expended too much energy too soon.

Chris: I got the impression toward the end that they were selling their fatigue. In fact, I thought they sold it too much. All the staggering around and acting blown up looked too melodramatic to me, like they REALLY wanted you to think that they were spent but they tried to hard.

I agree that the acting was not on the level, but I must ask, if they really weren't blown up then why did they all of a sudden look like they were about to keel over, if not drop dead? I mean, they had been putting over the toll a little bit, but it was like 25 minutes of not being all that bad and then suddenly 5 where they were on their deathbed. If it was all acting then it was as coherent a storyline as when the Dukes of Hazzard are going over a cliff when they go to commercial, and then 2 minutes later they come back from the break and, instead of being at the bottom of the cliff, they are pulling into Uncle Jesse's.

Chris: I think this makes my point about them not really being *as* tired as they look. They wrestled 25 minutes where they were fine. Then, almost as if on cue, they became tired and worn down, each trying vainly to finish the other off before time ran out. They could have easily done a finish where they got a surge of energy and finished hot, but this way it shows that they can fight each other to a standstill. They wore each other down, but couldn't finish each other off, which shows that they are equally matched. I'm not saying the story was well done here, but that is how it looked to me.

30:00

Rating:

Bad Nurse Nakamura vs. Meiko Satomura Taped 9/5 Honkawagoe Pepe Hall Atlas (1,500)

A boring brawl. As a whole, the match wasn't terrible. However, Nurse was similarly "Great" to current Muta, which meant she was truly Bad. She used a fork to bloody Satomura, and Tommy Ran had to literally rip it out of Nurse's mouth to get it away from her. Nurse got a submission victory with the sankakujime.

Martinez: Okay, Bad Nurse is still bad yes, but she was a lot more interesting gimmick wise. She really played up her freaky girl gimmick a lot more than I saw her do in FMW, and she looks to be in much better shape. She also stuck to what she could pull off rather than doing moves that she might blow horribly. Boring, but still better for Bad Nurse.

11:06

Rating:

Manami Toyota (AJW) vs. Meiko Satomura Taped 9/23 Tokyo Korakuen Hall (1,800/1,500)

This was typical of Toyota against younger wrestlers. Her work was good and she did all her spots, so the match was entertaining, but it didn't serve any purpose at all. Toyota once again didn't respect her younger opponent, so she didn't really put Satomura over and the outcome was never in doubt. We saw some good moves, but who cares? The point was for Satomura to challenge, yet all this match showed was she wasn't even remotely close to Toyota's level. Toyota pinned Satomura in her Japanese ocean cyclone suplex hold.

Chris: Exactly. Who cares? When Satomura fought Kyoko on 9/20/97, you thought maybe, just maybe, it would be possible for her to beat Kyoko. Sure, it was obvious she wouldn't, but that little bit of hope that Kyoko gave by putting Satomura over so well made that match great. This, on the other hand, was just a glorified squash by Toyota, which is nothing new for her.

Michael: Since Manami doesn't work for GAEA, I can't blame her for not letting Satomura show that's she's close to her level. When Manami wants to she can make a young opponent look as credible as possible (see the Noumi match from the 3/98 AJW TV show), but why should she when her opponent isn't from AJW? I know you can bring up the same point that you did for the Yagi match and say that she's getting paid to make her opponent look close to her level or whatever, but I'm sure if Chigusa told Manami to work the match similar to the way that Kyoko did her match vs. Satomura then she would have. The mentality is not to let the younger girls look that good against you, which I agree is wrong, but that's the way it is.

The mentality is one of the main reasons the genre is dying a slow painful death. Every promotion is making less money than they should be because they aren't giving fans reason to attend. Once in a while they come up with a new dream match of two stars from the 80's or early 90's that, for whatever reason, never really crossed paths before. For the most part though, it's the same old lineups producing worse matches because the stars are past their prime and keep getting a year older. All kinds of excuses can be made, but as it relates to this match, Manami wasted Chigusa's money and everyone's time. I certainly wasn't surprised that she did this because we've seen her do it before. The main thing that's holding all the younger wrestlers back is the older ones all refuse to pass the torch. Without them doing that, the younger wrestlers can never get over because wins over opponents that no one takes seriously don't make people think you are great, especially when you are just trading wins with these people. The more veterans run over the youngsters, the less chance they have of ever being taken seriously as stars or becoming draws. This was on the same level of badness as any number of blunders the leagues have made in the past few years, but you love Toyota so you defend her rather than admit she went 180 degrees against what the point of the match should have been. If you want to say Chigusa deserves much of the blame for still booking matches involving herself and other veterans where her young wrestlers that should be stars are punked then that's fine with me. The point is this shouldn't have happened to Satomura in 1997, and certainly shouldn't have happened to her in 1998. As much as I hated the Matsunagas forcing people to retire prematurely, at least they were successful in creating new stars. Matches like this piss on whatever progress has been made toward people seeing Satomura as a star.

18:05

Rating:

Special thanks to: Michael Smith & Chris Martinez