Joshi Spotlight: AJW’s Japan Grand Prix 2000

AJW- THE JAPAN GRAND PRIX 2000:
* It’s been a while since I’ve seen these, but the person who runs this YouTube channel just uploaded clipped versions of all but the finish. This is actually a single-elimination tournament, but HOLY COW that last match is a must-see! Zenjo enters “Push Ito” territory big-time and they make it a doozy in the end.

The participants:
Yumik Hotta: Shoot-style worker and Zenjo’s most credible wrestler.
Manami Toyota: The current WWWA Champion.
Kaoru Ito: Rapidly entering the main event tier.
Tomoko Watanabe: The new All-Pacific Champion.
Kumiko Watanabe: All-Pacific-level wrestler and typically Tomoko’s partner.
Nanae Takahashi: Kind of a powerhouse but a lesser star rising the ranks. Current Tag Champion.
Reggie Bennett: Reggie’s back! She left Zenjo when its financial fortunes failed in 1997, and she joined the newbie company ARSION, but is already gone from there (probably for similar reasons).
Etsuko Mita: One-half of LCO and always willing to eat pins.
Mima Shimoda: The other half of LCO.

FIRST ROUND:
MANAMI TOYOTA vs. MIMA SHIMODA: There’s only one first round match for some reason. The former Tokyo Sweethearts at each other again! Like every match ever they appear to delight in ripping on each other and yanking each other’s noses up by the nostrils, but Shimoda whips a pink chair at her, bashes her into the walls of Korakuen, then missile kicks her on to a pile of chairs. Manami fires up and Germans her, is seen doing her “run off the aisle tunnel” spot again, then hits her Missile Dropkick Suicida and a Moonsault for two. Clipped to Shimoda’s Death Lake Driver (tiger superplex) and two Rolling Ax Kicks in a row earning the “Fuck YOU!” bridge. Manami Moonsaults her holding the pink chair (ref won’t count) and the JOCS… gets two! And then a weakened Shimoda THROWS FIRE AT HER and hits the Big Punch of Death… for two! Shimoda avoids another JOCS but Toyota no-sells her German counter and just starts punching her a bunch and then hits the JOCS for the finish at (2:26 of 17:51 shown). haha I like how Shimoda was clearly turning around to eat the finish but Manami was like “NOT YET!” and spun her back for more punches so she could get more reactions now that punches are a big deal in puro and she probably wanted a better reaction first. These two are always fun- Manami always goes full “Get My Shit In” when Shimoda’s against her and this was no exception. Wild that she lets Shimoda eat all those finishes with no pin.

QUARTER-FINALS:

REGGIE BENNETT vs. KAORU ITO: Reggie beats on Ito to start, but gets taken down into a figure-four and the leg is stomped. Reggie counters a whip with the whirling slam & suplex. Ito goes to the leg again but various clipping sees Reggie hit a counter-lariat and Samoan drop so the big splash gets two. Ito escapes a powerbomb and takes out the knee, then roars to set up a BIG powerbomb for two. Good reaction for that- Reggie’s a big girl and went up NICELY for that. Reggie catches a lariat and hits her own powerbomb, but the JESUS CHRISTO Flying Splash misses and Ito hits two Flying Stomps, one to the KNEE, setting up the kneelock submission at (3:13 of 10:51 shown) to a great reaction. Good little bout they were showing, though they just kept clipping to Irish whips and people already having hit the top rope, lol. Reggie was bumping well for Ito and putting her over, though her knee injury seemed to disappear every time Ito wasn’t actively working on it.

YUMIKO HOTTA vs. MANAMI TOYOTA: The top two wrestlers! Clipped to Manami’s Missile Dropkick Spam, but she loses a kickfight and Germans out. Toyota gets a Moonsault, but Hotta nails her with the Caribbean Splash (straightjacket super-german) when she tries another. Pyramid Driver gets two, then Manami backdrops Hotta to the floor and hits her springboard dive. Hotta gets missile-kicked in the back but avoids the Japanese Ocean Cyclone Suplex and the shittiest shotei ever (essentially holding her hand out for Manami to run into it) gets the pin at (2:08 of 5:21 shown). God I hate SHOTEIMANIA running while on puro. Also interesting to see them do such a long match in a smaller circuit, but this is clipped to only the big moves- they might have just lied around in holds for the rest of it.

KUMIKO MAEKAWA vs. TOMOKO WATANABE: Clipped to a lot of stuff, then a Pump Kick/Slingshot move double-strike doesn’t go their way (miscommunication). Kumiko gets her bridging suplex and a bunch of kicks, but Tomoko starts avoiding them and hits a German. Kumiko just keep shitting her with kicks every second until Tomoko finally gets a lariat counter & Screwdriver (one-armed ligerbomb) for two. Hellsmasher (double-arm powerbomb) gets three at (2:07 of 12:35).

ETSUKO MITA vs. NANAE TAKAHASHI: This is from a very dark show out in a parking lot somewhere, judging by the dirt/gravel ground outside the ring. Nanae no-sells the Blazing Chop again, but gets brained and choked out by a yellow chair, but Mita biffs it HARD trying a dive. Oof, right onto the gravel. Nanae hits her dive, then a missile kick, but her flying back senton eats feet. Nanae counters the DVD to a German, then a chop to another, but Mita counters the NanaRaka (falcon arrow) to the Death Valley Driver for three at (1:28 of 15:59 shown). They get into a hair-pulling scrap after the match.

SEMI-FINALS:

TOMOKO WATANABE vs. KAORU ITO: They greet each other immediately with stereo lariats, bouncing off one another and firing more off until Ito uses an Ass Attack- spirited opener! Tomoko hits a facecrusher & judo flip, but Ito starts up her “Ito is invincible” thing by absorbing a lariat, but knows to sell the NEXT one, as Tomoko hauls her down with one. A fight on the floor sees Ito hit a powerbomb, but she misses her Flying Stomp Suicida and a running lariat floors her. Back in, there’s another “powerbomb/missed stomp” but Ito manages to catch a rana with a Ligerbomb and Flying Stomp- Tomoko’s selling is AMAZING, haha- that open-mouthed look of agony. But Ito tries another powerbomb and NOW Tomoko ranas her! Ito reverses for two but eats the “get-up lariat” counter and the Screwdriver gets two. Ito pushes her into the corner to stop the Hellsmasher and when Tomoko charges out, Ito snags the lariat for a Fujiwara armbar and gets the flash submission at (3:38 of 12:27 shown)! Ooh, unexpected! Man, I always forget how good the chemistry is with these two- they’re both such solid fireplug wrestlers they never mess anything up and they can just tee off on each other with good-looking, stiff offense and knowledgeable counters. In this case, Tomoko over-relies on the lariat and that keeps catching her, especially as Ito’s durability improves with experience.

ETSUKO MITA vs. YUMIKO HOTTA: I would imagine this one isn’t in question- the Ace vs. the person who ALWAYS does the job to Main Eventers. Mita immediately shoots for the DVD, but Hotta blocks it and the Blazing Chop and kicks her down, but Mita cleverly pulls the yellow chair in front of her so Hotta smokes it with her rolling kick. Clipped to Hotta beating her out of a lockup and blocking another Chop and enzuigiring Mita down (great “hair flip-collapse” sell by Mita). Mita blocks the tiger driver but nearly has her arm pulled off, screaming as she desperately rolls away, but Hotta keeps blocking everything and tiger drivers her for two. SHOTEIMANIA hits, but Mita weakly grabs the bottom rope to save herself, acting dead. Hotta puts Mita up top for the Splash, but Shimoda SPEWS RED MIST at her and Mita hits the DVD for an absolutely last-moment kickout by Hotta. Hotta sells being supremely messed up by the mist, misses another shotei attempt, and now MITA sprays red mist, and this nets her another Death Valley Driver… for THREE (2:21 of 12:34 shown)! MITA PINS HOTTA! This is a totally wild upset considering Hotta is basically the top wrestler in the company, but of course as the finals would be Hotta/Ito, which is the big Main Event Match the company wants to build to, they probably don’t wanna give that away just yet. And this makes it a super-unfair result, as Hotta was dominating the vast majority of the match and only cheating kept her from winning- the red mist is thus put over as a huge threat, as is LCO’s cheating in general.

JAPAN GRAND PRIX FINALS:
ETSUKO MITA vs. KAORU ITO:
* This one’s a longer clip!

Ito charges Mita as soon as she hits the ring, bashing her around a but, but Shimoda trips her up and Mita chairshots the crap out of her! Death Valley Driver on a chair in the stands! Mita stumbles to ringside as Ito is busted wide open, blood trickling down in multiple paths. She staggers over to ringside as Mita comes off the apron with a Greco-Roman chairshot. It gets wrapped around Ito’s head and she’s piledriven on it as she puffs her cheeks out to increase the blood flow, but in a GREAT bit, Mita counters the counter, but Shimoda spews the Red Mist like last match and misses, leading to Ito backdropping Mita to the floor and flattening them both with a dive! Time for a Mita ass-whuppin’! She’s whipped into some fans, then laid on the stands so Ito can OH SHIT- climb up onto the ledge eight feet above her and come down with the stomp!

I swear everyone who trained at the Zenjo dojo is a crazy person.

Naturally Ito biffs it hard on the landing, flinging back through the narrow stands- Shimoda pounces, but a bloody Ito flings her around and has Momoe Nakanishi bodyslam her to set up a stomp off the chair on a ledge above the floor! Momoe pulls Mita to ringside so Ito can Flying Stomp her for two, and a big powerbomb gets the same. Mita tries to give chase with an electric chair drop, but Ito pushes her off and hits another Flying Stomp, but tries another and Mita brings her down with the DVD- for two! “Ito-oh! Ito-oh!” chant breaks out as Ito is OVER. Mita’s face as she struggles to her feet is tremendous- just like “UGH can this please be over?” with one eye squinting and her hair all over the place, just totally discombobulated by the match. This justifies it when she’s unable to capitalize quickly, her next DVD countered to a Ligerbomb- last-second kickout! After another 30-second sellfest, they’re up, but Mita hits the DVD again- again two! 30 seconds later, Mita’s like “It’s over!” but Ito slugs her to the floor- FLYING STOMP SUICIDA! And Mita’s whipped back in for two more Flying Stomps- and Ito wins at (8:43 of 10:31 shown)! Kaoru Ito is the Japan Grand Prix Winner! She’s awarded the trophy after cutting a bloodbath promo to shit-talk LCO.

Ito learning from the “Crush Gals School of Drawing Reactions”.

Oh wow, what a tremendous short match! They did this PERFECTLY, hitting a ton of potential MDK stuff in the early going to justify the bloodbath early on and just how dead they are only 6 minutes in, making every move more impactful. Ito eating a DVD in the stands and being bloodied silly puts her over as a huge badass (which is the point of the entire thing), especially once she starts kicking out of big moves later, and her own insane stomp off the ledge makes her look A) crazy, and B) like she can dish it out as well as take it, which goes a long way towards making a main eventer. Mita played her part perfectly, just being a big bruiser- she gets Ito bloody at first, then just hits bomb after bomb- rather than bite the cut or try to torture Ito, she just hands her all the punishment she can to ensure a pinfall, which makes Ito look resilient instead of “able to surpass great pain” (Ito isn’t really in the Tomoko-tier of selling extreme agony anyways). LCO cheating to win the last match and then using it frequently here, only to have them stopped by NanaMomo, also payed off the previous match, and Ito knowing to avoid the red mist made her look smart.

Rating: **** (a truly excellent later-period match, making perfect use of the match time)