Dramatic DDT

DDT “WRESTLE PETER PAN 2019”, 15/07/2019
Tokyo Ota Ward Gymnasium

0. Hotel Saint Inn Kurashiki Presents Exhibition Match: Kota Umeda Vs Keigo Nakamura
0. Nihon Partner Kaikei Services Presents Tokyo Joshi Pro Under Match: Rika Tatsumi, Nodoka Tenma & Yuki Aino Vs Natsumi Maki, Yuna Manase & Himawari Unagi
1. Shunma Katsumata, Yuki Iino & Mizuki Watase Vs Yuki Ueno, Naomi Yoshimura & Nobuhiro Shimatani
2. DNA First Life Alumni Match: Kazusada Higuchi & Ryota Nakatsu Vs Kota Umeda & Kouki Iwasaki
3. Super Joshi Pro Wars 2019: Saki Akai Vs Yoshiko
4. DDT Extreme Title – IPPON Fluorescent Lighttube Death Match: Akito (c) Vs Asuka
5. Iron Man Heavymetalweight Title – Time Difference Battle Royal: Toru Owashi (c) Vs Kurochan Vs Shiro Koshinaka Vs Furitsuke Kamen Vs Joey Ryan Vs Yukio Sakaguchi Vs Makoto Oishi Vs Antonio Honda Vs Kazuki Hirata Vs Mad Paulie Vs Tomomitsu Matsunaga Vs Gorgeous Matsuno Vs Hiroshi Yamato Vs Pokotan Vs Yuki Kamifuku
6. Human Windmill 2nd Generation Vs Taiho 3rd Generation: Hideki Suzuki Vs Yukio Naya
7. Chris Brookes & Masahiro Takanashi Vs MAO & Mike Bailey
8. O-40 Title – Weapon Rumble: Sanshiro Takagi Vs Super Sasadango Machine
9. Dramatic Dream Match: Shinya Aoki Vs Danshoku Dieno
10. KO-D Tag Team Titles – Souken Holdings Presents: Daisuke Sasaki & Soma Takao (c) Vs HARASHIMA & Yasu Urano
11. KO-D Openweight Title – BLACK OUT Presents: Tetsuya Endo (c) Vs Konosuke Takeshita

For the first time DDT’s annual supershow is being held inside Ota Ward Gymnasium for an ambitious experiment. This year’s “WRESTLE PETER PAN” will be a free show with tickets being given out through DDT’s website. At the time of writing two of the three sections advertised are sold out, the Arena seats and the A Stand seats. The B Stand seats are still available and whatever is left on the day of the show will be given out one way or another so expect a packed venue. Just ignore that there is a 350 yen processing fee, because of course there’s a processing fee. The goal of this event is to spread the name of DDT and the best way to do that is hold a free show inside a big building to attract fans new and old. DDT’s connections with CyberAgent and AbemaTV helped make this happen.

This show also kickstarts DDT’s goal for 2020, to approach the level of New Japan without sacrificing what makes DDT, well, DDT. During an interview with Yahoo Japan/Weekly Playboy, it was mentioned that DDT’s last peak happened five years ago. Seeds have been planted since then with the new generation of DDT wrestlers. If it takes five years for a new boom period to begin then DDT believes now is the time to strike! If it doesn’t work, then no matter. The show must go on and DDT will do what they can to avoid being repetitive.

So what is happening on the card? There is the return of this generation’s biggest feud over the top championship, a heel aims to destroy his babyface past, an MMA superstar faces the heart of DDT, a new championship for senior wrestlers is created, the next No. 1 Contender is being kept busy, the grandson of a famous sumo wrestler takes on one of the most skillful wrestlers around, a wacky Battle Royal will happen, only one lighttube will get smashed, a joshi rivalry is reignited and a class reunion leads to a farewell.

0. Hotel Saint Inn Kurashiki Presents Exhibition Match: Kota Umeda Vs Keigo Nakamura

Kota Umeda is pulling double duty. His match on the main card is more important but DDT wants to give their newest trainee Keigo Nakamura some ring time so Umeda gets to wrestle twice. Also DDT has sponsored pre-show matches that need to be filled. Nakamura has had two previous exhibition matches and played minor roles in a few street wrestling matches this year so he is quickly getting the DDT experience.

0. Nihon Partner Kaikei Services Presents Tokyo Joshi Pro Under Match: Rika Tatsumi, Nodoka Tenma & Yuki Aino Vs Natsumi Maki, Yuna Manase & Himawari Unagi

The Tokyo Joshi Pro midcard get the Ota Ward spotlight this time around. Seems fair since the main eventers have now reached the level where they are getting bookings in America and Europe. While they are out flying the flag abroad, they are plenty of others around to represent TJPW at DDT’s biggest show. Rika Tatsumi is still finding her footing since coming back from an arm injury back in February. Her efforts to get into the title scene had been disrupted by drama over her former friend Hyper Misao joining the dark side. She also has her hands full wrestling the HiSPC class girls that came after her. The Bakuretsu Sisters may be going into Ota Ward as the new Tokyo Princess Tag Team Champions if things work out for them. Nodoka Tenma & Yuki Aino have a title shot two days before “WRESTLE PETER PAN”. Natsumi Maki’s time in Tokyo Joshi has been free of the controversy that followed her when she debuted for the company in January. She formed the Pandemic Boo-Boo tag team with Hikari Noa and rarely takes the fall in losses. Yuna Manase is fresh out of reaching the Tokyo Princess Cup final. Her performance in that tournament seems to have breathed new life into her career so now the world is her oyster. Himawari Unagi won a fan vote to get into the Princess Cup and has gathered a following online over her love of bubble tea. She also teams with Manase a fair bit whenever she isn’t put with the rest of her classmates.

1. Shunma Katsumata, Yuki Iino & Mizuki Watase Vs Yuki Ueno, Naomi Yoshimura & Nobuhiro Shimatani

The redundant DNA brand has its fingerprints all over the first two matches on the main card. Shunma Katsumata returned from his cheek bone fracture and with Yuki Iino got deep into the feud between ALL OUT and the Sendai Girls. Both of them are heading into this match as two thirds of the KO-D 6-Man Tag Team Champions. Joining them is Mizuki Watase who is still struggling to find a higher place on cards without Shigehiro Irie being there to prop him up. There is talent in Watase but a lot is still missing for him to step up. I don’t know if a move to BASARA or Ganbare☆Wrestling is needed to solve this problem but he looks like a man without a country right now. The other team is an unholy mix of DISASTER BOX and DAMNATION. The pair of Yuki Ueno & Naomi Yoshimura have to team with Nobuhiro Shimatani after they failed to become tag champions. Other than that things have been working out swimmingly for the two ever since Yoshimura joined DISASTER BOX. Shimatani has the most important job out of all the DAMNATION wrestlers on this show and that is to carry around the DAMNATION signboard.

2. DNA First Life Alumni Match: Kazusada Higuchi & Ryota Nakatsu Vs Kota Umeda & Kouki Iwasaki

The other DNA match involves multiple brands and is the last time Kota Umeda will wrestle in a big venue before he leaves the profession. Umeda is quitting DDT on 21st July to work for his family’s business in Kumamoto. Family has always been important to Umeda and he was going to go as far as retire from pro wrestling for them despite only being 24 years old. However DDT convinced him just to quit the company so if he ever wants to come back, he won’t be breaking any retirement vows. Umeda’s partner for his second last match is Kouki Iwasaki. He hasn’t looked back since joining Ganpro and spreading out to other promotions. Their opponents are probably the two top graduates from DNA. Kazusada Higuchi has now firmly found his balance between heavyweight wrestling and wacky comedy behavior. Ryota Nakatsu is coming off of a strong Union MAX Title run in BASARA. He won’t have his Sparky stablemates with him but he never really needed to rely on them either.

3. Super Joshi Pro Wars 2019: Saki Akai Vs Yoshiko

Throughout Saki Akai’s wrestling career there has been one figure who she thinks has played an important role as a rival. That’s Yoshiko. She was one of Akai’s debut opponents and Akai was her first challenger when she was the World Of Stardom Champion. In another world the two could have been childhood friends like Sakisama and Yoshiko-sama are. But whenever Akai gets the opportunity to make her own match, Yoshiko’s name usually pops up as an opponent. This is what’s happening here. Akai wanted a singles joshi match on DDT’s biggest show of the year and decided now is the chance for her to surpass Yoshiko. Maybe it’s possible because the match is happening a few days after Yoshiko was in a big Beyond The Sea Tag Team Titles defence in SEAdLINNNG. Her entire focus was on that match and she admits she didn’t have much time to think about Akai. But what she can promise is she will show everyone in Ota Ward how harsh and pitiful Akai really is. Akai on the other hand has had time to plan and think about this match. She will use her feelings as a pro wrestler to power her way to victory!

4. DDT Extreme Title – IPPON Fluorescent Lighttube Death Match: Akito (c) Vs Asuka

Akito is the DDT Extreme Champion but he is also fighting to answer a simple question that’s been bothering him lately. Is he boring? He has the skills for sure but his challenger Asuka thinks he is dull as dirt (it could be worse, he could be as boring as the current WWE or ROH main event scenes). Asuka thinks the Extreme Title would be a much better fit for her than Akito. She wanted a death match with hundreds of lighttubes involved to prove it but Akito turned it around by making her fight in an IPPON Fluorescent Lighttube Death Match instead. There is only one lighttube and whoever breaks it is the loser. Akito explains that the fear of only breaking one lighttube rather than smashing through hundreds of them is what makes this match type more thrilling. Plus with no pinfalls needed to win, Akito can feel more relaxed in the ring and not worry about getting rolled up. See, he put a lot of thought into this. Would a boring man act that way? Asuka is at a disadvantage because she is struggling to understand the point of the match even after watching videos of the previous times the rule was used.

5. Iron Man Heavymetalweight Title – Time Difference Battle Royal: Toru Owashi (c) Vs Kurochan Vs Shiro Koshinaka Vs Furitsuke Kamen Vs Joey Ryan Vs Yukio Sakaguchi Vs Makoto Oishi Vs Antonio Honda Vs Kazuki Hirata Vs Mad Paulie Vs Tomomitsu Matsunaga Vs Gorgeous Matsuno Vs Hiroshi Yamato Vs Pokotan Vs Yuki Kamifuku

The Iron Man Heavymetalweight Title has had a little bit of a quiet 2019 so far. Don’t get me wrong there was some eventful title changes that happened. The belt swapped hands a bunch of times in New York, the Governor Of Ehime became champion and a chair held the title. But other than that it’s been the usual stories about the championship. Maybe there’s not much to do because it’s been overshadowed by the new WWE 24/7 Title. But like I said at the start, the show must go on. Toru Owashi is the champion as this is being written and DDT is selling a rubber mask of his face at the show. Kurochan is the comedian from the Muscle show at Sumo Hall back in February. Shiro Koshinaka celebrated his 40th anniversary in wrestling at the start of the year. Other than an office pro wrestling cameo this is his first proper match in DDT since November 2017. Furitsuke Kamen is the pro wrestling alter ego of celebrity choreographer Lucky Ikeda. He showed up in DDT for a dance match back in March. Joey Ryan is back in DDT and is in a new stage of his career where he has no contracts to worry about. His matches still gives Jim Cornette material for his podcast. Yukio Sakaguchi went through a roaring rampage of revenge against DAMNATION in the early summer but wound up empty handed. Makoto Oishi had a little time in the spotlight in April when he was chosen for a title match. He was supposed to be an easy defence but proved to be anything but. Antonio Honda won the Extreme Title in a Panty☆Hunt Tiger Cub Rope Death Match but lost the belt to Akito in his first defence. Kazuki Hirata continues to dance and feud with an 11 year old. Mad Paulie has been trusted by the rest of DAMNATION to win the Iron Man Title so the unit will sweep all of their title matches on the show. Tomomitsu Matsunaga’s highlight of the year has been… I don’t know, losing to Bull James or something? Gorgeous Matsuno has taken a step back from his gatekeeping duties and only appeared in DDT for special occasions. Hiroshi Yamato has begun to proudly talk about the amount of different promotions he wrestles in. If you don’t see him wrestling, you’ll see him singing or shilling his erotic fiction instead. The DDT mascot Pokotan hasn’t been perfect since its debut. It often loses its head during matches which makes it violently malfunction. Last but not least there is Yuki Kamifuku. She was added to the match when Kurochan asked for a woman to be included. Kamifuku agreed to take part but got cold feet when she figured out Kurochan only wanted a woman included so he could act the pervert. He wants to hit three birds with one stone: win the Iron Man Title, kiss Kamifuku and then go get married together.

6. Human Windmill 2nd Generation Vs Taiho 3rd Generation: Hideki Suzuki Vs Yukio Naya

Yukio Naya made his DDT debut at “JUDGEMENT 2019” in Sumo Hall. He liked the experience so much that he signed with the company three months later! The grandson of sumo yokozuna Taiho Koki didn’t waste any time picking his targets. He wants to be the best heavyweight in DDT so he immediately set his sights on the big boys like Higuchi and Mad Paulie. A lack of experience lets him down but Naya has been picking up wins against smaller competition. His next big match is against Hideki Suzuki, a frustratingly talented veteran. He hasn’t watched any of Naya’s matches, only saw pictures of his bout with Higuchi and has no special thoughts about his opponent. He does have some criticism though. Naya has said in interviews that he does not expect to beat Suzuki but wants to do his best to at least make the match enjoyable. Suzuki thinks if Naya is not wrestling to win then he shouldn’t be wrestling at all. Otherwise this match is just a waste of time. If Suzuki has to teach him that lesson in the ring then so be it.

7. Chris Brookes & Masahiro Takanashi Vs MAO & Mike Bailey

At first this match seemed a little throwaway and was positioned further down the card. But when Chris Brookes instantly became DDT’s new favourite adopted son things changed. The English wrestler has only been in DDT for a month but he has taken the company by storm in ways I have not seen since El Generico’s run in the company seven years ago. He took to the street wrestling matches like a duck to water (partly because one of those matches was in a pool )and in his spare time lived a dream puroresu holiday that would leave even the most hardcore wrestling fan green with envy (shhh, don’t tell Will Ospreay that). The crowning achievement of this tour may not have happened yet. On 21st July Brookes will be challenging for the company’s main championship so he will definitely keep a close eye on the main event. Masahiro Takanashi’s profile has dropped a little bit ever since Shuten-dōji split up in April but he hasn’t been keeping quiet. There’s been times this year when Takanashi brought in his friends Shota, Yumehito Imanari and Baliyan Akki to disguise themselves as him and distract opponents. It’s been a winning tactic for the most part but not used as often as its success rate would suggest. Brookes & Takanashi have tagged together only once so far but they already have a team name: Calamari Drunken Kings! Facing them is The Moonlight Express, one of DDT’s top tag teams in recent years. MAO & Mike Bailey were at their strongest in the springtime when they held the KO-D Tag Team Titles and STRONGEST-K TAG Titles at the same time. MAO continues to do fucked up wrestling for a fucked up world, which crosses the big boss sometimes. Speedball has been the nice boy he always is but he’s starting to get lost in the crowd with no clear direction for now. Maybe his shot at putting together a Beer Garden show with MAO next month can spark some inspiration.

8. O-40 Title – Weapon Rumble: Sanshiro Takagi Vs Super Sasadango Machine

Things were looking rough for Sanshiro Takagi on the road to “WRESTLE PETER PAN”. His failure to convert a Right To Challenge Anytime, Anywhere Gauntlet into a championship victory left him absent from the card and frozen out of the show. So imagine how random his luck is when of all things a tweet from TAJIRI not only leads to Takagi getting a match but a rather significant one too. When TAJIRI tweeted about how pro wrestling as an art is split into different tiers with comedy wrestling being in Tier 3, Super Sasadango Machine took offence to that opinion. Particularly, he took offence on behalf of Takagi thinking the tweet was directly aimed at the Big Boss. Takagi doesn’t believe for a second that TAJIRI was talking about him but if Sasadango is demanding to wrestle Takagi in a Weapon Rumble to prove TAJIRI wrong then he may as well go along with it.

It doesn’t end there. Sasadango also asked for a new championship to be on the line for the match. He noticed that there are now many pro wrestlers competing into their forties and that can be inspiring for the DDT fanbase in the same age group. So he has created the O-40 Title (O-40 meaning “Over Forty” of course) with the hopes it will be defended across the wrestling industry. Takagi accepted the proposal and thinks it is a nice parallel to the main event being between two wrestlers in their twenties. Both men have their weapons prepared to be at their most devastating, both physically and mentally. But what of TAJIRI? Will he be there? Sasadango had been expecting to get an apology from him but has heard nothing since the match was announced. He knows TAJIRI is touring Europe at the moment so maybe he got lost somewhere in Malta.

9. Dramatic Dream Match: Shinya Aoki Vs Danshoku Dieno

What can Danshoku Dieno do to prepare for Shinya Aoki? Putting himself through a gauntlet of different martial arts gave him some experience of what to expect. Although when some of the representation included swimming and kabbadi then maybe the results are a little suspect. It doesn’t help that Dieno isn’t entirely sure what kind of match he is having with Aoki. It can’t be MMA because everyone knows he’ll get slaughtered. Maybe there’s a chance if it is just a regular pro wrestling match but who the hell would expect DDT to go that direction? Dieno’s tactic should be to bring out the most ridiculous shenanigans he can think of. Aoki can only go along so much with it before he starts losing his mind. But it would be unfair to assume Aoki’s tolerance for wackiness is limited. He had no problem disguising himself as Pokotan to sneak attack Dieno a few weeks ago. Who knows what silly ideas of his own will be brought to life here.

10. KO-D Tag Team Titles – Souken Holdings Presents: Daisuke Sasaki & Soma Takao (c) Vs HARASHIMA & Yasu Urano

What was once happy memories for Soma Takao are now nothing more than horrible nightmares. There was a time when he was in a unit called Smile Squash with HARASHIMA & Yasu Urano. The group fell apart when Urano left DDT to go freelance and Takao stabbed HARASHIMA in the back to join DAMNATION. But if you take Takao’s word for it, his time in Smile Squash was terrible to the point where even saying the unit name out loud makes him cry. It was Takao’s dream to have a championship match in his hometown but Smile Squash just had to come back and ruin the moment for him. But luckily for Takao he has Daisuke Sasaki looking out for him with a solution. When they successfully defend the KO-D Tag Team Champions, Sasaki & Takao will become the newborn Smile Squash! Of course, DAMNATION’s comments should be taken with a lot of salt. HARASHIMA & Urano are the same good nurtured wrestlers they always are. Urano is extremely happy to compete for a DDT championship again which is something he did not expect when he left the company two years ago. Sasaki made fun of Urano at the contract signing for looking like he hadn’t changed a bit since he left. Urano thinks he doesn’t need to change because he’s always been himself. If he does change anything, it will be him winning the tag titles with HARASHIMA!

11. KO-D Openweight Title – BLACK OUT Presents: Tetsuya Endo (c) Vs Konosuke Takeshita

Two years ago this match main evented Sumo Hall with Konosuke Takeshita defending the KO-D Openweight Title against Tetsuya Endo. This time around the positions are reversed and what a road it took to get here. When DDT went to New York in April, Takeshita lost the KO-D Title to Daisuke Sasaki. That by itself would be one of the biggest DDT stories of the year but another title change happened minutes later when Endo fell to temptation and cashed in his Right To Challenge Gauntlet to become the champion at his leader’s expense. Endo came back to Japan as a newly reborn New Yorker and has defended the title four times. His reign has brought stability to the championship after a crazy eight months of title changes. Meanwhile Takeshita earned his spot by winning the King Of DDT tournament and closing out an inter-promotional feud with the Sendai Girls.

This isn’t a rivalry because according to Takeshita rivals are meant to motivate each other to do their best against each other. What he has with Endo is more of a grudge or in Endo’s case outright hatred. The two have not been in each other’s good books ever since Endo joined DAMNATION back in the summer of 2016. In their singles matches Takeshita has usually gotten the better of Endo but they have only had two singles bouts since “RYOGOKU PETER PAN 2017” and Takeshita won neither of them. Endo has also gotten over on Takeshita with some mind games during the build up. An ankle injury prevented Endo from competing in a 3 Way with Takeshita and Endo at the last Korakuen Hall show. But when the match was over Endo attacked Takeshita and showed his injury wasn’t as bad as it seemed. He’s also gotten into the habit of throwing Takeshita out of the ring from a Torture Rack to the floor. Whoever wins they won’t have much time to recover. In a week’s time the KO-D Champion will be defending against Chris Brookes and he doesn’t care who he faces. Whatever happens after that is anyone’s guess!