7/22/2025

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Recommendations From A History Man

In Peter Edge’s latest look back, he focuses on some of the game changing women’s matches over the past four decades.

July 13th is the most important day in not just women’s wrestling but the history of women altogether. You see, this is because July 13th is the day “Evolution” airs on Netflix here in the UK and it just happens to be the 10th Anniversary of the start of the Divas Revolution when Stephanie McMahon happened to invent the concept of women.

Sorry, I don’t know what happened there. I took this red pill and all of a sudden I became pro-WWE. Warning: Side effects include you ending up enjoying Carmello Hayes matches, enjoying watching TNA in 2025 and thinking Tony Hinchcliffe is funny.

Seriously though, the word ‘Revolution’ got banded around the women’s division during this time despite the fact that revolutionaries were paving the way forward for women’s wrestling in the decades before, so I thought on the weekend where WWE “Evolution” takes place on the weekend of the 10th anniversary of the segment where Stephanie (and the Fedheads) tells me was the launchpad for the women’s division, I take a look at some historic matches in women’s wrestling from the 80s, 90s, 00s and 2010’s.

Jaguar Yokota vs Devil Masami – 7/9/83

As a lost media nerd (by the way, Ian Riccaboni is also one – true story, we once had a multi post discussion in a Discord about Wheel of Fortune lost media once) this match was one of the holy grails of wrestling lost media and its posting on a video channel called Mike Doe made its unveiling so much fun. As much as WWE Vault posting never-seen-before footage is fun, it’s not an unbelievable find if it’s been in an archive vault that the company has owned for more than 2 decades.

This match is the main event to one of the biggest shows of the era and the blowoff to the Masami vs. Yokota feud, yet it was missing for four decades. Especially frustrating because we have a match from that same show. Apparently the guy who recorded the show on VHS botched the recording of the episode of AJW on TV. Devil vs. Jaguar appeared on by putting in a VHS tape with only about 25 minutes left to run, so that’s why the Crush Gals vs. Mimi Hagiwara & Noriyo Tateno match on the same episode is out there but the main event was never recorded.

The opening minutes were a tease, as with Jaguar’s fast start it’s like the memorable Yokota vs Lioness Asuka match a year later (can someone please post this match on YouTube so I can review it?) but things slow down dramatically and it’s good, regardless of the hope the first few minutes brought. There’s some great spots like a sensational crossbody from Jaguar that actually got me purring like I had seen a Syuri armdrag in person and a nuts piledriver spot.

The finish is unique and can be seen as unusual by fans who have been trained to see high impact moves finish matches, but it kind of works – especially with the post-match scenes. ****

Taryn Terrell vs Gail Kim – 2/6/13

You can put this one under “unexpected gem”. When Tiffany left WWE in 2010, the expectation, like many of the Divas Search alumni, was that she was one and done in terms of promotion. So when Taryn Terrell turned up in TNA, you had to give credit where credit was due that she wanted to make a go of this wrestling malarkey.

Initially in a backstage role as an authority figure (just like her days in WWECW), she eventually found herself in a feud with Ms. TNA, a founder mother of the Knockouts division, Gail Kim. The feud would end at “Slammiversary” in a Last Knockout Standing Match.

An LKS match and its structure is a good kind of match to hide limitations (or perceived limitations, in this case), but Taryn did away with any perceptions made about her with a really good performance. She went full throttle, including a missed dive that Cody Rhodes could learn from in how not to cut yourself hard way in doing a dive to the outside elevated ramp.

But the star of this is Gail. She bumped like hell for Taryn, with a spot in which Gail hit a wedged chair and took the best bump in that spot I’ve ever seen and in a match long story point of the ring post figure four, Gail’s selling for Tayrn’s turn to execute the spot was exemplary.

The final spot is one of the more memorable spots in Knockout history and in credit to TNA and Keith Mitchell, words I thought I’d never say, the camera position is fantastic – as is the decision to use the angle they used in the replay to show its effects. Also Taryn deserves love for the confidence she had in herself despite her experience level going for a spot with such little margin of error.

While people will point to the Kim/Awesome Kong matches as the pinnacle of the Knockouts division in TNA, I like this match better, because of the level of difficulty in certain spots, plus it was a great showcase for what women’s wrestlers at the time could do when not burdened with the old fashioned beliefs of WWE management. ****¼

Cheerleader Melissa vs Ayoko Hamada – 11/4/10

As Dave Prazak says, this is one of the best joshi wrestlers of the 00’s against one of the best (and in my opinion THE best) American women’s wrestlers of the 00’s, who is also the one of the best cases of how mainstream American companies butchered women’s wrestling on the whole before the “Revolution” happened. TNA actually took the best women’s wrestler in America and put on a burka and told her to put on a Middle Eastern accent.

This match itself is a great showcase for Melissa who is at the top of the list of women wrestlers who were born 10 years too soon because she would have been a brilliant addition to a roster these days.

Maybe my love for Melissa Anderson is going to cloud this review but her performance helps elevate this match, despite Hamada’s moments of sloppiness and sometimes downright weirdness (I’m still trying to figure out what the hell that backwards roll was). Her selling, pin kickouts and chain wrestling work was spot on and she saved Hamada from completely messing up a moonsault from the turnbuckle to the outside when she moved quickly to meet a wayward Hamada. Ok, Melissa might officially be on my SLG list.

The match is good and is a worthy edition of the dream match canon. But Hamada’s inconsistency in the ring was very apparent on this night. ****

Aja Kong/Kyoko Inoue/Takako Inoue/Sakie Hasagawa vs Mayumi Ozaki/Dynamite Kansai/Cutie Suzuki/Hikari Fukuoka- THUNDER QUEEN BATTLE!!!!! – 31/7/93

If I say the words 8-man tag Ironman Match, the initialism WTAF might be said by some people and that’s why this match is called THUNDER QUEEN BATTLE!!!!!

In 1992, All Japan Women and Joshi Wrestling Pro came to an agreement to put on an inter-promotional feud, and while the trilogy of matches between AJW’s Manami Toyota and Toshiyo Yamada against Dynamite Kansai and Mayumi Ozaki might have been the standout of the rivalry – this match is just as good even though it didn’t get the attention of the three tag matches.

The ruleset for this match saw the first 20 minutes be essentially four 5 minute singles matches with a member of each team going against each other in what is termed as THE FIRST ATTACK!! In what are 5 minute sprints, the pace didn’t let up – with highlights being a shock in the Super Athlete Battle to kick things off, a Super Performer Battle that does what it says on the tin, that included a spectacular looking surfboard by Kyoko. The Matinee Idol Battle between Takako and Cutie (I’m not sure Matinee Idols are supposed to do the kind of photobook Takako did at this time) was thrilling and the World Champion Battle with Kong and Kansai had an awesome start. When the 8-women tag that would make up the final two thirds started, it saw Kong as the ultimate impact player.

The thing with great hour matches is if I wrote about all the great moments in said hour, I’d break the 2,000 word limit. But I should note the stiffness of the match, Hasegawa’s gorgeous rolling butterfly suplex and Fukuoka’s mind games by cosplaying Manami Toyota at various times, even with the attire Hikari wears for the match. The feeling in the final twenty minutes that the next fall will be the final fall raises the urgency to 11.

The teams trying to isolate the opposite team’s weak links and the need for JWP to take out Aja Kong make for fascinating concurrent threads during the 40 minutes of multi-woman tag action.

But it’s the final five minutes that is the making for this match to become an all-timer, and for Kansai and Ozaki to shine as the host promotion’s aces, in what is a thrilling final act of what is an epic. *****

By Peter Edge

Retro News

Eddie Hamill

1943-2025

Eddie Hamill, who wrestled predominantly during the World of Sport era in the UK as “The Amazing Kung Fu” passed away during the last week at the age of 81.
The Northern Irishman had grown up in Belfast, applying himself to judo before he found wrestling thanks to an article in the local Belfast Telegraph newspaper. That article would take him to “The Pit”, and later Milo’s Wrestling Gym, as he began to learn his craft under the guidance of “Whipper” Dave Mack and Noel “Darkie” Arnott. The tough conditions and intense training led to Hamill developing an aggressive but fast paced style ahead of his debut at the St. Georges Hall in the city in 1964.
Eddie would begin under the name Mike “Judo Hamill” before transferring to the “The Amazing Kung Fu” gimmick in 1971, for which he was most known, as his dates quickly expanded from Northern Ireland to the rest of Ireland and the UK. By gaining work with Joint Promotions, he was able to appear on a regular basis on the “World of Sport” show on linear television channel ITV, leading to bouts with the likes of Jim Breaks, Mick McManus, Sid Cooper, Clive Myers and Mark “Rollerball” Rocco and an unmasking at the hands of Kendo Nagasaki in the Royal Albert Hall in March, 1976. He would also tour Canada with Stampede Wrestling, getting into the ring with the Dynamite Kid, Bret Hart and Davey Boy Smith. He also made appearances in Turkey, Zimbabwe, Italy, France, Qatar and Bahrain.
Injuries had begun to take a serious toll on Hamill by the late 1980’s, leading him to make the difficult decision to retire from wrestling in 1990 and take up a full time position as a lifeguard for the RNLI in Rhyl, North Wales.
The former British and Commonwealth Middleweight Champion was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award for his contributions to wrestling in 2011.

Kurt Angle will join Chael Sonnen and Bubba Jenkins to form the broadcast team for the Real American Freestyle event on August 30th at the Wolstein Center in Cleveland, Ohio. Angle won a gold medal in freestyle wrestling at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta as well as the World Championships in the same year.

Announcements for the new venture continue to be made on a regular basis, with Bo Nickal, Darrion Caldwel, Lance Palmer and Wyatt Hendrickson all signed on for the project, but none have seemed to have any impact on ticket sales, as the event is still several hundred off from having a 1,000 tickets out. The most noticeable thing about the recent promotion is the complete lack of involvement from both Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff, who have been much less vocal (and visible) following the initial launch.

Marcus “Buff” Bagwell underwent a leg amputation to his right limb earlier this month after several attempts to fix the leg after a 2020 car crash had failed. The accident had left him immediately hospitalised for several weeks, undergoing 21 separate surgeries as part of his in the period thereafter.

His recovery was not an easy one, as the former wrestler admitted it led him to isolating himself and excessive drinking before Diamond Dallas Page played a key role in helping him to attend rehab and achieve sobriety over the past three years.

The 53 year old made the amputation decision after a procedure on the leg led to it becoming infected, leaving only a 20% chance of avoiding amputation with additional surgeries. We wish him all the best in his recovery.

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The Saudi General Entertainment Authority’s annual sportswashing extravaganza, Riyadh Season, culminated with WWE’s legitimately sold-out “Night of Champions” card.