Joshi Spotlight: JD’ Get Miracle

https://archive.org/details/1999-12-28-stv-jd-1-547965748-456239358

Another show found on the Archive!

JD’- GET MIRACLE:
(Dec. 28th 1999)
* Okay, time for something different! Archive.org stuff wasn’t working for me for the longest time, but I was clued in to a handful of JD’ shows from 2000, and because I’m desperate to not JUST review GAEA Japan for the year, I’ll check some of it out! This one is from late 1999, which might clue me in to the nature of the promotion going into the year 2000. This one features the final match ever of Miori “Cooga” Kamiya- a JD’ Title match against Lioness Asuka!

So JD’ (said out loud as “Jay Dee Star”… eventually? Not yet? I guess that comes later. The dash is silent now I think!) is a promotion that actually has TV and had Jaguar Yokota doing the training, and currently has Lioness Asuka (seen a lot in GAEA) as the top star and booker. I’m only vaguely familiar with most of the wrestlers and definitely don’t know any of the angles, so I’m going in pretty blind. Cooga is Miori Kamiya, a Zenjo-trained wrestler who retired and came back under a mask in JD’. Yuko Kosugi & Sumie Sakai have been around for a couple of years (they won AJW’s Japan Tag Titles as a rookie duo). Megumi Yabushita is similar, and is actually an MMA star, too! A total scrub (19-23 stats), but still. KAZUKI is from the same era as the other kids, and Morimatsu is from FMW in the early ’90s. I’m pretty sure Morimatsu’s in black & white and is bigger, while KAZUKI is smaller and in green. Lioness Asuka is the Ace of JD’ and a true legend.

We’re shown clips of a tag match from the month before, Asuka teaming with Shark Tsuchiya against JWP’s Dynamite Kansai and someone- Asuka accidentally sprays mist into Shark’s face and gets her pinned with a Kansai lariat.

COOGA, YUKA KOSUGI & SUMIE SAKAI vs. LIONESS ASUKA, MORIMATSU & KAZUKI:
(Dec. 7th)
* Asuka’s squad attacks before the bell, but Cooga soon makes a comeback with a variety of strikes (mostly rolling kicks)- a flying knee hits Morimatsu and Asuka chairs Cooga to stop the pin. This brings everyone into the ring, and Cooga uses that to hit a rolling pin on Morimatsu for the pin (1:31 shown).

MEGUMI YABUSHITA vs. YUKO KOSUGI:
* Kosugi, in pink frilly gear, is a pretty skinny idol-looking type. Yabushita is dressed like a short purple Etsuko Mita- very similar gear.

They do some clusmy rookie-fu to start (Yabushita does rolling shoves but has to stop short so Kosugi can counter one)- camel clutch, that see-saw thing with all the limbs pulled, half-crab- the works. Kosugi fires off some stomps to come back, then more rookie-fu (bodyscissors! dragon sleeper as resthold!). After four minutes of this, Yabushita shocks me by catching a lariat and basically backflipping into a jujigatame! Someone obviously hit the “start the real match” button because Kosugi follows with a JB Angels-style run up the ropes to a missile kick and a Northern Lights suplex, then Yabushita hits a superplex into a springboard cannonball. Kosugi flips her off the top and flying stomps her for the “Fuck YOU!” bridge, then some clumsy brawling leads to Yabushita doing the “flip them off the top” move and a shitty German gets two. A double-wrist German gets two, and a second gets the pin at (9:22). Very much a rookie-style match, except they obviously had this intention of doing Half-Resting and Half-Trying because suddenly every single move is a big move- flips off the top, flying off the top, and back arching suplexes. The normal stuff looked clumsy and the big moves looked good, which is the opposite of how it usually is. And as soon as they start brawling again it looks like they’re both out of position and not sure of what to do.

Rating: *1/2 (clunky and off-puttingly un-choreographed for half of it, then randomly good for a while)

SACHIE ABE & OBATCHI IIZUKA vs. HIROYO MUTO & RANMARU:
* … okay I’ve never heard of anyone here. OH SHIT AND NO ANNOUNCEMENTS!! UGH now I gotta Google this. Muto is a tall-ish, tomboyish girl with a bowl cut and an ugly white & green singlet. That makes Ranmaru the one in the blue bodysuit & mask. Abe is probably the one in yellow- she shows up on Google. Her chubbier friend in the pink pajamas does not. Everyone here is a total baby, having debuted around 1998.

Muto/Ranmaru attack to start with exploding… bread? What was that? But the other team comes back with a tope & plancha. IIzuka does a fisherman’s suplex (appearing to change her mind from a slam, unless Ranmaru, who lifting her leg prematurely, reminded her) then a twisting splash off the top. Abe breaks up the pin and sets a lead-assed Iizuka up top, and Ranmaru hits a Spider German Suplex into a twisting cannonball- pretty sure she tatered her good on that one XD. Oh and that’s the pin at (2:53 of 9:34 shown). Damn they’re randomly clipping these and catching me unawares. Looks like Iizuka sucked and wasn’t going up for stuff well (this might explain why I can’t find much on her), Ranmaru can do some flippy stuff, and the rest I dunno.

SANA ENDO (Neo Ladies) vs. KAZUKI (JD’):
* My research of KAZUKI wasn’t for naught! She’s here taking on the most forgettable wrestler in Neo- Endo. KAZUKI is indeed the one in green. Endo immediately goes “mean dominant veteran over weakling noob” and whups KAZUKI’s ass. Clipped to KAZUKI coming back with an arching suplex, but Endo stuffs her and hits a German into her Guillotine Legdrop for two. KAZUKI tries a flash pin, but eats two weak Dragon Suplexes for the pin (2:52 shown of 6:39). Why show only half of a match that doesn’t go seven minutes, lol?

CRUSHER MAEDOMARI & MORIMATSU vs. THE BLOODY & FANG SUZUKI:
* Ah, so this is where the FMW B-Team ended up when they stopped running women’s matches. Here the two short-haired Ultimate Warrior-painted brutes take on JD’ First Class originals. I remember The Bloody being a good rookie. Fang is in a black shirt & pants, looking like a second.

Team FMW attacks to start for a clipped crowd brawl, then Crusher smashes The Bloody with a chair, but gets sat in it and held back by Fang so Bloody can missile kick her. Crusher bites Bloody in the face to counter a taunt and clotheslines them both. Morimatsu largely ignores a stick-shot from Fang to hit a lariat for two. Bloody bridges out after a sack of shit slam, but walks into a lariat for two. Fang’s in and we get a STICK/CHAIR FIGHT, but Bloody cheats to pepper Morimatsu with weapon shots. Fang hits a rolling fireman’s and Vader Bomb for two, but Morimatsu stuffs a Doomsday Device and Crusher sprays mist to set Fang up for a Michinoku Driver- the FMW team wins at (4:38 of 6:56 shown). Looked SUPER short and very simple, but was fine.

Rating: ** (your basic average wrestling match, but full of tons of good down-home cheating from both sides)

SUMIE SAKAI (JD’) vs. NANAE TAKAHASHI (AJW):
* Nanae is a Kyoko Inoue wannabe who hasn’t gotten good quite yet, and isn’t credible, but she’s on the level of Sakai, a judoka with some capability. Sumie’s in light blue & white, and Nanae’s in purple, and absolutely dwarfs her opponent.

Nanae easily shrugs off Sumie’s strikes due to her larger size, and puts on a bodyscissors, but Sumie puts her in a deathlock and pulls back. She works some holds but runs into a side slam and 2nd-rope dropkick as we’re still in “rookie-fu” as they’re probably not used to working together. They BRUTALLY mess up a pair of tilt-a-whirl slams (Nanae has to catch her upside-down and deadlift her, putting her down gently, then the next one also looks bad as Sumie goes down feet-first). Sumie fights for a German, but Nanae counters with her own. Sumie fights for a top rope move, settling for dropkicking Nanae to the floor, then hits a dive & fires off missile kicks for two. Nanae shoves her out and hits a tope, misses a Vader Bomb, and hits as superplex for two. Vader Bomb- two! Sumie counters a wild swing with a backdrop hold for two, but gets German’d when she climbs- she fires back with a… OH GOD! She drops near vertically off a super rana, spiking herself upside-down as Nanae for some reason went FORWARDs and then slipped on the ropes so she was instead just pushing Sakai. Oh god that could have been ugly. Ref does the “Hey, u ded?” thing as a dazed Sumie covers, then tries a moonsault- Nanae gets her feet up and a big backdrop suplex gets two. She tries for a move but gets caught in a rana for two, then manages what she was going for. A … was that a falcon arrow or a front suplex? Like it looked as if she was going for the falcon arrow but gave up halfway through and dropped her in a sit-out. Uh and that scores the pin at (9:32 of 13:33 shown). Nanae gets on the mic after and gets charged by Kosugi to set up something else.

A pretty ugly, yet hard-fought, match, as it has the proper CADENCE of a good match but their execution was hideous and somewhat business-exposing at times, with Nanae having to deadlift Sumie into “tilt-a-whirl” moves. And then they utterly mess up a Super Frankensteiner spot AND the finish.

Rating: *1/2 (almost has the flow & cadence of a good match without any of the good wrestling in the middle, because it looked like they were botching things left and right and doing ugly falls)

TWF WORLD TITLE:
LIONESS ASUKA vs. COOGA:
* Yes this podunk company is calling its belt a “World” Title, lol. Cooga seems to be the second biggest star JD’ has- as her peak is like *** on her best day that’s iffy.

Apparently Cooga is now a very kicky wrestler, as she throws “kicks” repeatedly, catching Asuka in the butt, missing an ax kick but hitting a rolling one. These are very unconvincing. Tornado DDT off the apron sets off a crowd brawl, and an “ax kick” on the top rope sets up a superplex. Asuka finally ignores a flurry and beats the shit outta her, making a much better impression. A methodical beatdown full of slamming moves starts, but Cooga counters some lazy groundwork to a deathlock and moves to the leg. Asuka gets the floor to escape the Leg Hump and comes back with chair tosses and the like, and the Blue Thunder bomb gets two. Lioness controls with methodical stuff and a chairshot, then lariats her out of a comeback. Cooga finally DDTs out of a suplex and cannonballs her off the apron, but Lioness kicks her in the ass out of a flying cannonball. Lioness brings in her table, but clubs it herself and a release Tiger suplex gets two. A clunky fight over the table leads to Morimatsu running in and nailing Asuka by mistake, but she still hits a piledriver for two. Cooga avoids a chairshot and hits a flying knee for two, but Asuka avoids a tiger driver and wipes her out with a rolling kick. She tries a big powerbomb, but Cooga again, counters to a DDT, then a shitty inverted DDT (the first inverted DDT I’ve seen in all my joshi watching) and the Tiger Driver gets two for Cooga.

Lioness kicks out of a cross-armed pin Cooga keeps going for, but misses a Moonsault and Cooga gets it for two- the long set-up for that move kind of robs it of impact. Cooga fights out of an Iconoclams (?!) and misses an “enzuiknee” (ie a short hop off the second rope) and stumble-walks to the other side of the ring (oh man she is BLOWN UP) so she can backdrop Lioness out. Lioness comes back with chairshots galore and powerbombs her OFF THE APRON through a table- ouch! She then whups Cooga with the table piece and stomps her through ANOTHER one, this time from the third step of the bleachers! Back in the ring, a Flying Stomp to the table and a Ligerbomb get a close two-count for a good reaction. A second also gets two, and when Lioness tries the Towerhacker Bomb (fireman’s to spinning ligerbomb) Cooga escapes with a shitty rollup for a really near-fall. Lioness stuns her with a lariat and the Towerhacker Bomb STILL can’t get it done, and so she does some new thing- a leg-hook Michinoku Driver gets the three at (18:31). Cooga makes a big show out of unmasking dramatically, acting defeated- this is in fact her retirement, and she never wrestles a serious macth ever again. Her retirement ceremony is in two months.

Oh man, this was “Skilled Veteran Carries a Scrub to a LONG Match” 101, as Lioness plays it up like Ric Flair in a unique way- putting together a match where she can control the pace and flow while also getting countered every 2-3 moves so Cooga still looks competitive. As Cooga doesn’t really do a lot of good stuff it leads to some repetition, and finally Lioness has to let her kick out of every damn move she has (even the Towerhacker Bomb) to put over how “good” she is. Cooga came off like a 4/10 who was bagged, beaten-down and too sore to compete, so Asuka’s showcasing of her here seems all the more impressive.

Rating: **3/4 (a one-woman show from one of the best to ever do it)

So that’s a JD’ show! It’s a pretty breezy watch, but not the most exciting thing at the moment. The clipping seems to be less egregious than other shows, leaving pretty adequate matches behind.