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Post by bossrock on Aug 20, 2019 19:08:19 GMT -5
After Brody, probably the first Meltzer favorite to fall under much scrutiny over the years. When it comes to the "go-go-go" nature of Joshi, she's usually considered the standard-bearer. And I definitely understand and agree with a lot of those criticisms. Not a particularly great seller (doing neck bridges to break out of pins after being walloped for 15 minutes by Aja comes to mind). Relentless pace to the point where it seems as though she's just throwing and endless barrage of dropkicks. But while her tag work with Yamada is still highly-regarded and should be as such, I think she brought a lot to the table as a singles worker. Was she better than Aja or Hokuto? I would say no. But she could still deliver in a big match situation and be counted on to deliver a great deal of excitement and drama. She also had some pretty great offense even if she did occasionally sacrifice precision and finesse for speed. She sort of reminds me of Kenny Omega in a lot of ways in that she was a flawed worker but still a pretty great big match wrestler.
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Post by kas on Aug 20, 2019 19:31:21 GMT -5
Might be the ultimate work-rate wrestler, having a lot of great series of matches with a good variety of opponents. Very few matches have left me in awe like the Toyota vs Kyoko Broadway has. She gets a lot of rightful criticism about her lack of long-term selling, but I don't think she gets enough credit for her short-term selling. The Toyota formula was basically to get dominated by her opponent for the first ten minutes and make a comeback, and her selling during those ten minutes is usually great and really good at drawing the crowd in. Probably the best example of this is the Aja Kong series of matches. Also should be considered for one of the best tag workers of all time, where a lot of her singles match flaws were hidden.
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Post by elliott on Aug 20, 2019 19:43:15 GMT -5
I really like matches between wrestlers with differing styles. So while I find stuff like Toyota vs Inoue or Toyota & Hasegawa vs Double Inoues to be tedious, I'm still a really big fan of Toyota vs Kong and I absolutely adore Toyota vs Kandori. I need to revisit the 92 Yamada singles matches.
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Post by nintendologic on Aug 20, 2019 19:55:26 GMT -5
You all need to watch the Toyota/Kansai match I nominated. I think it shows that however flawed Toyota may be as a worker, she had a strong sense of how to work as an underdog against a much larger opponent.
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Post by elliott on Aug 20, 2019 20:13:57 GMT -5
Yeah that Kansai match is awesome. There's also the Hotta match.
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Post by elliott on Aug 21, 2019 20:21:53 GMT -5
I've been thinking about making master lists for all the pimped matches we could come up with for each individual wrestlers specific thread. I started one for the Aja thread and since I watched the 3 big Aja/Toyota matches today, I figured I'd start one for Toyota as well. Feel free to add to these and I will edit the matches in.
Manami Toyota, Mika Takahashi & Kaoru Maeda vs Aja Kong, Grizzly Iwamoto & Bison Kimura (Hamada's UWF 06/04/90)
Manami Toyota & Mima Shimoda vs Toshiyo Yamada & Etsuko Mita 6/18/89
Manami Toyota vs Yumiko Hotta (AJW Grand Prix 06/17/90)
Manami Toyota, Mariko Yoshida, Kaoru Maeda, Mika Takahashi & Esther Moreno vs Aja Kong, Bison Kimura, Madusa Miceli, Tarantula & Xochilt Hamada(Hamada's UWF 11/17/90)
Manami Toyota vs Akira Hokuto (AJW 01/11/91)
Manami Toyota & Esther Moreno vs Bull Nanko & Bison Kimura (AJW 04/29/91)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Aja Kong & Bison Kimura (AJW 03/20/92)
Manami Toyota vs Toshiyo Yamada (AJW 06/21/92)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Akira Hokuto & Kyoko Inoue (AJW 06/27/92)
Manami Toyota vs Toshiyo Yamada (AJW 08/15/92)
Manami Toyota vs Mariko Yoshida (AJW 08/30/92)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Mayumi Ozaki & Dynamite Kansai (AJW Dream Rush 11/26/92)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Aja Kong & Kyoko Inoue (AJW 12/13/92)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Mayumi Ozaki & Dynamite Kansai (AJW DreamSlam II 4/10/93)
Manami Toyota & Yumiko Hotta vs Aja Kong & Kyoko Inoue (AJW 4/24/93)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Megumi Kudo & Combat Toyota (FMW 5/5/93)
Manami Toyota vs Akira Hokuto (AJW 08/21/93)
Manami Toyota & Akira Hokuto vs Aja Kong & Sakie Hasegawa (AJW 11/12/93)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Mayumi Ozaki & Dynamite Kansai (AJW 12/6/93)
Manami Toyota & Akira Hokuto vs Toshiyo Yamada & Kyoko Inoue (AJW 12/10/93 Match 1)
Manami Toyota & Akira Hokuto vs Toshiyo Yamada & Kyoko Inoue (AJW 12/10/93 Match 2)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Etsuko Mita & Mima Shimoda (AJW 01/24/94)
Manami Toyota vs Sakie Hasegawa (AJW 06/03/94)
Manami Toyota & Toshiyo Yamada vs Kyoko & Takako Inoue (AJW 10/09/94)
Manami Toyota vs Aja Kong (AJW Big Egg Universe 11/20/94)
Manami Toyota & Sakie Hasegawa vs Kyoko Inoue & Takako Inoue (AJW 01/04/95)
Manami Toyota vs Aja Kong (AJW 03/26/95)
Manami Toyota vs Aja Kong (AJW 06/27/95)
Manami Toyota & Sakie Hasegawa vs Kyoko Inoue & Takako Inoue (AJW 08/30/95)
Manami Toyota vs Akira Hokuto (AJW 09/02/95)
Manami Toyota vs Yumiko Hotta (AJW 09/03/95)
Manami Toyota vs Dynamite Kansai (AJW 12/04/95)
Manami Toyota vs Sakie Hasegawa (AJW 03/20/96)
Manami Toyota & Mima Shimoda vs Mariko Yoshida & Kaoru Ito (AJW 09/28/96)
Manami Toyota vs Shinobu Kandori (AJW 08/23/98)
Manami Toyota vs Kyoko Inoue (AJW 12/08/99)
Manami Toyota vs Kaoru Ito (AJW 2/24/02)
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Post by bossrock on Aug 21, 2019 21:51:58 GMT -5
I will say that I enjoyed the broadway match with Inoue even if it's far from perfect and probably not in the top 10 for best 60-minute draws. And even if my mind wandered a few times, I admire the ambition and how much action they managed to fit in.
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