A little ARSION

Hiromi Yagi & Rie Tamada v Tiger Dream & Ayako Hamada (ARSION, 12/7/98)

This was pretty decent. It was largely go-go and resembled more of your standard joshi tag in terms of pacing and momentum, but ARSION doing a standard go-go joshi tag will be more palatable than the majority of other places doing go-go joshi tags. ARSION matches don't normally go over 15 minutes as well, so it's hard to hit overkill territory even when there's lots of stuff going on. Tamada and Yagi feel like the more cohesive unit here and after the first 10 minutes of mostly back and forth it settles into them trying to rip off Hamada's leg. That the leg work was a direct response to Hamada going after Tamada's taped up shoulder was cool. Hamada managed about 45 seconds of targeting that arm before she was stopped dead, and not once did she get the chance to go back to it. These were some of the quickest, nastiest dragon screws you'll ever see. Yagi and Tamada absolutely wasting Tiger Dream with missile dropkicks from all angles also ruled, as did the double stomps. Good grief the double stomps.

Hiromi Yagi & Rie Tamada v Michiko Ohmukai & Yumi Fukawa (ARSION, 12/18/98)

I don't know why everyone was so chippy before the bell. Fukawa had a stick up her butt about something though, and as soon as the match started they went right to the crowd brawling. We have established many times on this here Whiskey & Wrestling that joshi crowd brawling is the worst, but I did like how they never bothered with the walking and brawling part and instead they just chucked each other into rows of chairs while spectators had to scramble. So as far as joshi crowd brawling goes it was fine enough. Tamada and Yagi felt like the more cohesive unit again, while Fukawa and Ohmukai had individual punchers' chances. Fukawa's puncher's chance was more her ability to roll into tricked out cradles and legbars, but Ohmukai's puncher's chance was very literal as she would look most dangerous when she was smacking people, booting them in the spine, hitting axe kicks to the crown of the head. My favourite part of the match was when Tamada ran at her with a roaring elbow and Ohmukai just punched her dead in the face. That's Ohmukai for you. She'll do that. 

Mariko Yoshida v Ayako Hamada (ARSION, 10/17/00)

This was the final of a one-night tournament and only went 11 minutes. A tournament final, even of one held on a single night, going 11 minutes and not 52 today feels damn near inconceivable. Shit even for 2000 it feels inconceivable, but then ARSION were all about doing things differently for a while there. A great little promotion. For a while there. These two were in a tournament final from '98 that I watched about a year ago now and at that point Ayako Hamada was in a very different place. That match didn't even last 11 minutes and Yoshida basically mopped the floor with the poor lass. I think she even beat her with a foot on the chest and then Hamada got carted out by three people like she was a carcass left in a ditch. Two years later and Hamada is now the grand old age of 19. I guess in pro wrestling terms you grow up quick because she handled herself much better here and at least felt plausibly on Yoshida's level. Yoshida was so fucking good. I don't just mean here, I mean in general. She can demolish you in a dozen different ways and she started this by jumping all over Hamada and trying to yank her into armbars and chokes and anything else she could think up. When Hamada tried to catch her in a bodyscissors, maybe just for a tiny bit of respite if nothing else, Yoshida applied the fucking STOMACH CLAW and then threw some of the greatest body shots she's ever thrown. For a glorious 90 seconds she then worked the midsection with gutbusters and body blows and this was looking like a legitimate 12-star affair. Pretty quickly Hamada made a comeback and they never returned to the body work, but it was amazing while it lasted. You also make peace with them moving past it as Yoshida very soon punches Hamada in the face so hard she starts selling her own hand like she broke it. Yoshida's arm is already taped up so I'm guessing this plays off a previous tournament match, but even on its own it ruled. This was also just about the greatest punch Yoshida's ever thrown. It was largely a sprint from there, but they absolutely blistered each other and I never felt like they went fully into spotty territory. It felt frantic, like two people who've just wrestled twice on the night know the adrenaline is going to wear off pretty soon. Some of the striking was exceptional and you had Hamada recklessly spin kicking Yoshida in the face and neck and Yoshida throwing haymakers. Hamada in particular worked with a real urgency, probably because she knew Yoshida needed to be put away with some haste. She tried one preposterous rolling submission thing that she definitely learned from her old man and Yoshida reversed it into a fucking kimura and I fell out the bed. Give me one good reason why I shouldn't vote Yoshida top 10 in the '26 GWE.