lostinube

I didn't realize until this year that they've been doing the Rice Bowl at the Dome on the 3rd pretty much the whole time New Japan has been doing the January 4th Dome show (Rice Bowl - 1991, NJPW - 1992). So they probably have it all down to a science. Which also means anyone who goes to Wrestle Kingdom can also go to the Rice Bowl if they forego the talk show the day previous.

Going on at the Tokyo Dome right now:

There are a couple of early 2016 Konami matches on this channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCq4o415dCRi5zJFwUTmXJHA

I'm assuming things like interpromotional matches, the big name joshi freelancers and the mainstay comedy wrestlers. Anyway, yes, Japanese companies tend to focus on their Japanese audiences. As an example, I'm connected in various ways to the SASUKE (Japan version of Ninja Warrior) community here in Japan. Despite overseas fans loving the Japanese version and many international competitors wanting to do the "real" course at Midoriyama, TBS is not a big fan of putting out the yearly show because it isn't the ratings draw that it used to be. They don't care that on broadcast night people are trying to find a stream of the show because it won't impact viewer ratings here in Japan. Edit: I should point out that I don't necessarily agree with the above but it's an example of how companies in Japan often operate.

http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20161215-00000099-dal-fight Not much extra there other than that she had esophageal cancer.

Tokyo Sports Year-End Awards: http://www.tokyo-sports.co.jp/prores/mens_prores/628622/ MVP: Tetsuya Naito Best Bout: Okada vs Marufuji - 7/18 G1 Climax Best Tag Team: Strong BJ (Daisuke Sekimoto & Yuji Okabayashi) Fighting Spirit Award: Katsuhiko Nakajima Distinguished Service Medal: Kento Miyahara Technique award: Kenny Omega Rookie award: Chihiro Hashimoto Joshi Wrestling award: Io Shirai Lifetime Achievement Award: Hayabusa

Hana and her mom were among the few who did double duty at Star Lanes on 11/23. Hana was a face on the Sendai Girls show and was mainly the face in peril during her match with Kansai against Mom and Miyagi. She doesn't have a ton of varied offense but then again Kyoko doesn't either. She did a decent job getting her face kicked by Mom though. As a pink and white clad youngster she isn't all that distinguishable from others of her age or experience. Could be that it was because Kansai, wrestling her last match in Hakata, was the main focus though Of course as a heel on the Stardom she can rely more on her evil sexy girl gimmick.

So Keiji Muto has announced a new project called "Pro-Wrestling Masters" with a show scheduled for February 8th, 2017. The main event is Muto/Riki Choshu/Tatsumi Fujinami/Jushin Liger vs Shiro Koshinaka/The Great Kabuki/AKIRA/Akitoshi Saito. AKIRA is the young kid on the block at 50. http://battle-news.com/?p=25576

Crowd funding for the Local Wrestler Directory (plus plus) 2017 is going on. All in Japanese however. But if you need a profile of Gabaijichan this is what you need to support. http://battle-news.com/?p=25476 https://moon-shot.org/projects/lwd2017-R

Kyushu Pro do a lot of stuff with local communities in Kyushu (even though I think Oita has it's own NPO wrestling indy) plus one of the guys they sent is a hometown boy. The card was way more stacked and focused on Dynamite than the Sendai Girls show in Hakata seemed to be. Also her last show in Kyushu proper. No joshi groups go out to Oita. From the looks of it, there was a high school band that performed and possibly some local idols so that probably helped. http://togetter.com/li/1055208

Random photos from the Hakata November 23rd double shot at Star Lanes: Sendai Girls: http://www.sendaigirls.jp/information/index.php#2 Stardom: http://wwr-stardom.com/?result=2016年11月23日　goddesses-of-stars2016#more-14608 Nothing earth shattering. No matches were actively bad. Sendai Girls: Would have been nicer if Shida/Syuri had won without an extra kendo shot thrown in at the end, The ending of Meiko/Aja seemed abrupt and like it was a mistake but I think (if you ever see the match) the ending was that Meiko went for one more move after both were down for a 8 or 9 count and missed and that was more than enough for Aja to pin her. Stardom: I'm down with heel Momo. Was surprised that Bito/Hojo/Kyona didn't win. I'm torn as to whether Hana is better as a face or a heel. The Kimuras were the only ones who worked both shows. Kyoko kicked Hana a couple times in the head. It was touching. Naturally "Emo" Shirai and Taya had a weird dynamic but was fine for what it was.

11/23 in Hakata will have a Sendai Girls show in the early afternoon and the Stardom show in the evening. So far the Sendai Girls show will have Mika Shirahime vs Hashimoto (with only a 15 minute time limit, which is weird) probably because Shirahime is from Fukuoka. And Dynamite Kansai's last match in Hakata where she will team up with Hana Kimura vs Cassandra Miyagi and Kyoko Kimura. Rest of the show hasn't been announced. The 23rd is a national holiday in Japan, Kinrokansha no hi (Labor Thanksgiving Day), and I think at least Sendai Girls are trying to make the Hakata show a regular thing (3rd year in a row, 2nd for Stardom).

Not sure if this is new or not. Fuji TV documentary series "The Nonfiction" followed Ice Ribbon wrestlers Maya Yukihi, Neko Nitta and Yuuka in 2014 and 2015. In a literal sense, the title of the show is "women who are cornered" where everyone involved has to or has made a big life decision. Both Yukihi (a former bank employee) and Yuuka (who was going to a cooking school before dropping out to wrestle) were starting out while Neko Nitta was about to finish up to move on with her life (the show kind of makes it look like she simply wanted to get married but on twitter she says if she found someone who was going to support her being a wrestler she would have married them - she just couldn't find anyone with the way her life was going at the time) This is the official channel so it won't be taken down anytime soon but it does cut off weirdly at the end. Another vid shows that it ended with Neko going to a konkatsu party where singles who are interested in marriage can meet others. Edit: So they did take the video down. Here is another version that has the Neko Nitta ending.

They have the NWA on Demand logo on their site but I don't know if it means anything. http://diamond-stars.com/

Tokyo Reporter site is slightly NSFW: http://www.tokyoreporter.com/2016/10/16/osaka-customs-nab-pro-wrestler-matt-sydal-for-marijuana-possession/

What is worse is that in the last couple of years there has been a campaign by the government on synthetic marijuana as it was a "loophole drug" that was being sold in shops. They closed the loophole and renamed them Kiken Drugs (literally dangerous drugs). Conveniently for the government, before and after the renaming (there was a contest for the new name) there were deaths related to Kiken Drugs. Not people killed by the drugs but people killed by people on drugs.

Considering how well the women's team did in the Olympics this year (4 gold medals out of 6 events plus a silver) and the fact that Saori Yoshida and Kaori Icho still maintain fairly high profiles in off-Olympic years, anyone not using their connection to the team would be a waste. But Hashimoto can be put over with a strong performance and still not win the belt so long as no one else goes over Satomura in the near future. Besides, the title itself is only about a year old so they'd be better off keeping it on Satomura to get more wins to build its prestige.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x4uy9pn_マツコの知らない世界-160927-2_fun Nothing important but just a short appearance of Okada, Ospreay and Roppongi Vice on a TBS variety show. The premise of the show is people talking with the host, Matsuko Deluxe, about different, sort of out of the mainstream topics. The girl - a Keio University student, not a talento - who speaks with her is a big wrestling fan and I think she says her father used to make wrestling mats. Interesting if only for the fact that it's wrestling just outside of golden time in Japan on TBS.

Cynthia Rothrock wasn't an Andy Sidaris girl. Her American output wasn't all that great but she was in a few fun HK films:

From here. They were supposedly fan portraits but I'd like to think that SUGI himself made them in his spare time. There was also another Japanese person (SUGI said it was through him that he got the idea and his contact that got the cannabis) involved but I don't know if anything happened to him at the time. He currently runs a company/makes wrestling gear for WWE and Japan wrestlers (most notably Rey Misterio Jr.) but he was AAA's Japan rep or something like that.

I think Arashi benefited from having other vets willing to give him a chance like Fujinami with Dradtion and then later Tenryu. If I recall correctly, Sugi put the drugs inside these portraits that someone (he?) gave to Nosawa and Io.

Still think it's weird that they did a tournament with a bunch of new foreigners. One thing about Bito is that physically, she is bigger and more "imposing" than most of the Stardom wrestlers and definitely moreso than the rookies, so I can see why they'd want to push her.

Hiroshima Carp clinch Central League Pennant, ending a 25 year drought.

He was a sumo wrestler of Taiwanese descent. Didn't have a very distinguished sumo career. Looks like he found his second calling as an actor after a fairly short stint of pro wrestling. Can't find any results past 1956 but by then it looks like he was into the acting thing. When people see him in movies et al, apparently they mistake him for Baba (and vice versa). Seems to be still alive at the ripe age of 96.